In Jane Campion's adaptation of Susanna Moore's novel, Meg Ryan plays Frannie Avery, a lonely literature professor obsessed with words and the study of language. Her predictable existence is suddenly turned upside down when she gets dragged into a sinister murder investigation after a girl is found gruesomely murdered in her garden. When Homicide Detective Malloy (Mark Ruffalo) arrives at her apartment to interview her about the night in question, there is an undeniable chemistry between them. When he later asks her out, Frannie's half-sister Pauline (Jennifer Jason Leigh) encourages her hesitant sister in the possible sexual encounter. But as the death toll starts to rise Frannie discovers the darker side of her repressed passion and as she finds herself falling for charismatic Malloy she also begins to lose trust in all those around her...