| Director | Barbet Schroeder |
|---|---|
| Budget | $50 million |
| Box office | $56.7 million |
Richard Haywood and Justin Pendleton are high school classmates; Richard is a cocky, wealthy and popular extrovert, while Justin is a gifted but introverted loner. Outwardly they are enemies, but secretly they are actually very close friends. After months of planning a "perfect crime," the duo abduct a woman at random, strangle her, and plant evidence implicating Richard's marijuana dealer, school janitor Ray Feathers.
Detective Cassie Mayweather and her new partner Sam Kennedy investigate the murder. She has sex with him early on as she had with previous partners, but will not let him see her chest, and curtly sends him home afterwards.
Footprints at the crime scene lead to Richard, and vomit nearby implicates Justin. Both have alibis, and deny knowing each other, but Cassie is convinced that Richard is the murderer and Justin is involved. Sam criticizes her refusal to consider other suspects, as most of the physical evidence points away from the two boys.
Cassie's boss, Captain Rod Cody, and her ex, Assistant D.A. Al Swanson, fearing Richard's influential parents, take Cassie off as lead for the case. Richard kills Ray, making it appear like a suicide. Sam, following the planted evidence, tracks down Ray. When he finds him dead, the woman's murder appears solved; but Sam is finally convinced by Cassie that she may be right, so continues the investigation.
Justin, who has a crush on classmate Lisa Mills, works up the courage to ask her out. A jealous Richard seduces Lisa, videoing them, then gives Justin a copy. Justin is enraged, but regains control, knowing the police are still watching them.
Cassie begins receiving calls from her ex-husband Carl Hudson, who went to prison for stabbing her in the chest 17 times. His parole hearing is coming up, and he wants her to speak on his behalf. Cassie confides to Sam that although she became a cop to prove to herself that she was not a victim, she is terrified of seeing Carl again. She also confesses that Richard reminds her of Carl, which is why she is convinced of Richard's guilt, and obsessed with proving it.
Sam and Cassie bring Richard and Justin in for separate interrogations, trying to induce them into implicating each other, but neither of them talks before they are both released. At the victim's home, Cassie determines how the boys carried out the abduction and altered the physical evidence.
Richard, knowing that Cassie is closing in on them, and having commenced a plea bargain with the DA, flees to an abandoned house. He convinces Justin to join him there, then produces two revolvers, proposing a mutual suicide. With their eyes closed, on the count of three, Justin shoots into the air, but Richard does not.
Justin demands to see Richard's gun, which is not loaded. As a furious Justin is about to shoot Richard, Cassie arrives. Richard grabs Justin's gun and shoots at Cassie, wounding Justin who tries to protect her instead. She goes after Richard, but he starts to strangle her on a rickety deck jutting out over a cliff. Cassie manages to gain the upper hand, knocking Richard off the balcony, where he falls to his death. Justin grabs Cassie, who is hanging off the edge of the deck, pulling her back into the house.
Cassie assures Justin that she will intercede on his behalf to get him tried as a juvenile, since he was an innocent dupe, manipulated by the ruthless Richard. Then she notices a mark on her neck caused by Richard's large ring, and realizes that the dead woman's neck did not have a similar mark. Confronted with the evidence, Justin confesses that he strangled the victim, proving his "courage" to Richard, and is arrested.
Cassie faces her fears and enters the courtroom to testify at Carl's parole hearing. The bailiff calls her to the stand by her legal name: Jessica Marie Hudson.