It concerns the coming of age of 13-year-old Janey, and is based on the novel Rain, written by Kirsty Gunn.

Janey is on vacation with her brother Jim, mother Kate, and father Ed, at their beach house on the Mahurangi Peninsula in New Zealand.

Ed and Kate, who are on the verge of divorce, sit in the backyard all day drinking whisky, leaving their young children to amuse and fend for themselves.

Cady, a local boatie who is having an affair with Kate, catches Janey's pubescent eye.

When Janey sees Cady photographing Kate on his boat, she persuades him to take pictures of her as well.

Rain was shot on location around the Mahurangi Peninsula on the eastern coast of New Zealand's North Island in April–May 2000, with the coastal beach and mudflats replacing Lake Taupō which was the setting of the novel the film was based upon.