[3] The film stars David Strathairn, Agnes Bruckner, Margaret Colin, and Frances Fisher.

She uses writing as an outlet for her troubled home life, having been abandoned by her father and now neglected by her mother Diane, whose busy work schedule leaves Meg as the babysitter for her younger sister, Lily.

After Meg reads aloud a poem (titled "Blue Car") in her English class, her teacher, Mr. Auster, recognizes her talent and assumes the role of a mentor and father figure for her.

Meg's home life worsens when Lily displays increasingly worrying emotional behavior; she cuts herself, refuses to eat, and speaks about becoming an angel.

After being checked into the psychiatric ward of a hospital, Lily kills herself by jumping out of an open window as she tries to "fly".

At the competition the following day, Meg leaves her "Blue Car" poem on her chair when she is called to the mic.

Karen Moncrieff wrote the screenplay for the film thinking it would not be produced because it was so "uncommercial", but it won the Nicholl Fellowship from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in 1998.

"[13] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 76 out of 100, based on 31 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".

[14] In a positive review, Lisa Schwarzbaum of Entertainment Weekly compared Moncrieff to Scottish filmmaker Lynne Ramsay, writing "Each has a knockout storytelling voice and works with a raw, innately feminine strength that scrubs away the soapy film from sad sagas.

"[15] Writing on David Strathairn's performance, Stephen Holden of The New York Times said his "complex, exquisitely nuanced portrayal of a man who goes over the line allows his character to be both hero and villain, sometimes at once.

[3][16][17] Mark Caro of the Chicago Tribune wrote Bruckner "delivers an indelible portrait of a girl on the brink of womanhood finding her own artistic voice and sense of purpose.