Tim Roth as Jeremy Stinson
Me as Melanie Marconi-Stinson
Kevin Spacey as Michael Marconi

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Fall From Grace
lyrics by Sarah McLachlan

The winter here's cold, and bitter
It's chilled us to the bone
I haven't seen the sun for weeks
Too long too far from home
I feel just like I'm sinking
and I claw for solid ground
I'm pulled down by the undertow
I never thought I can feel so low
But oh darkness I feel like letting go

But all of the strength all of the courage
Couldn't lift me from this place
I know I can love you much better than this
I fall from grace
Fall from grace

It's better this way, I said
Having seen this place before
Where everything we say and do
Hurts us all the more
Its just that we stayed, too long
In the same old sickly skin
I'm pulled down by the undertow
I never thought I can feel so low
But, oh darkness I feel like letting go

But all of the strength
All of the courage
Couldn't lift me from this place
Together we crumble and stumble and fall
I fall from grace
Fall from grace

i know i can love you much better than this
so it's better this way
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PLOT:

A man who goes to the local welfare office everyday, is just living from place to place and about to be evicted from the home he’s living in currently.  While at the local welfare office one day, he is seated in a little plastic chair by his counselor’s desk.  The counsellor is an old friend and they chat it up for awhile.

The counsellor asks the man “Do you have a place to stay tonight?”

The man confesses he doesn’t, but that he will find somewhere.

When the man gets up to leave, the guy looks across to see a young woman seated about a few feet in front of him facing him on an opposite chair.  She’s talking to her own counsellor.

“You are barely making ends meet in your place right now?  Is the rent due?”

The girl confesses the rent is a month overdue and she may soon be tossed out.  The counsellor offers to help, but tells her she’s unsure just how much she can do and that the girl must find work.  Then, her counsellor gets up.  The man smiles across at the girl seated opposite him.

She looks at him and smiles bravely, he can tell she hates to be here.  Not particularly interested, he tries to make her smile again, she looks away bleakily – he picks up a ball of paper on the desk and chucks it at her to get her attention, when it lands in her counselor’s coffee, the woman comes back to ask her what happened.  The girl pleads innocent, but can’t help laughing with the man across the office.

He asks her out for some coffee for themselves.  She’s unsure, not knowing him, but he suggests they just go down to the cafeteria in the same building.  Over the coffee, the girl doesn’t talk much but the man gets her to open up.  He finally proposes that if they marry – not only will she be able to keep her child, but he will be able to split the costs of her apartment and give him someplace to stay.

She’s very cagey about the whole thing at first, but the more he convinces the more she relents until she finally says ‘yes’ – as she knows she doesn’t want to run the chance of losing her child.

They marry that same day at a county courtroom.  It’s then she finally introduces herself – as Melanie Marconi, he tells her his name is Jeremy Stinson, of course – now her name is Stinson as well.  She takes him home to meet her son, Ricky.  He’s an adorable kid who takes to Jeremy right away, Jeremy simply adores kids and they soon make fast friends.

Melanie allows Jeremy to her bed, but all they do is sleep.  He makes it very clear it’s simply a business arrangement.  Unable to explain what has happened to her parents or friends yet – she accepts the situation, even when he begins to date women while married to her.  He tries to urge her to date as well.  At first, she’s frustrated and ready to toss him out – but when she sees Ricky’s attachment to him – she relents and allows him to stay.  It’s the first real father he’s had in some time.

Melanie spends all of her time taking care of Ricky and looking for work, Jeremy finds a part time job to help out and all seems fine.

One night, Jeremy tries to get Melanie to talk to him but she has been avoiding him for the last few weeks, he realizes it’s her way.  Though he knows well enough she’s not all she appears as he notices a tattoo marking her right hand, some little thing she did on a dare she confesses.

As he goes off to bed after a brief argument over expenses with Melanie, he opts for the couch instead – bored while watching TV, he starts to look through a drawer nearby for maybe some magazines to read and comes across a journal.

In it, it reads like Melanie’s diary.  Telling her entire life up to that point, her day to day thoughts and opinions on everything around her.  Fascinated, Jeremy begins to read it each night in secret from Melanie.  He begins to see her in a different way, and despite the fact that initially he wasn’t attracted to her – he begins to fall a little in love with the woman he secretly knows from the journal.

He meets her parents and acts like a saint, they adore him. She has no idea why his mood towards her changes, he is even starting to kiss her when she prepares supper, wanting to cuddle with her as they sleep.  They make love, it's more a coming together of their souls than their bodies - it's an amazing intimacy.  He tries to find her a friend – she is amused at the woman’s scripted conversation.  He gives her flowers and such.  She can’t understand the sudden attentiveness.

But, when she finds out – she becomes infuriated.  She tosses him out of her bed when he makes a move that only she had mentioned in her journal.   She tells him she had to write the journal – it was part of her forced therapy as she's a recovering alcoholic and she begins to tell him of her past.

But, what she doesn’t mention – is the fact she is still married.  Her husband shows up out of the blue one day, Michael Marconi, announcing he wants his son back and most of the possessions in the house.  Not at all an abusive sort, the man is still obviously a conniving lout.  He could charm a snake out of a tree – or so Melanie confesses.  She had signed divorce papers several  years ago, but could never track him down to sign them so she remained legally married to him.

Her welfare counsellor finds out the situation and threatens to take Melanie up on charges.  Jeremy backs away from the heated situation – realizing that he can’t remain married and that Ricky needs his real dad.  He’s also furious with Melanie.

Unable to move past her past, Melanie folds like a deck of cards when actually her husbands’ seeking to take all from her was just a ploy to convince her to let him stay and for her new hubby to get the hell out – which he does.

She goes on playing the loving wife to all around her.  But, still misses the one man in her life that understood and cared for her.  Jeremy is still angry with her and when he sees her in the street – he ignores her.  She’s crushed and knows there’s nothing she can do.  Time passes.

Jeremy who can't stand being away from either Melanie or Ricky, and because he wants to keep an eye on them to make sure they are alright - gets an apartment directly across the street from Melanie.  Each night, alone in the dark as Michael sleeps, she looks out searching windows for Jeremy, her heart still with him.  One night, Ricky asks why they can't see Jeremy anymore and she cries, sending him off to bed.  She sees lights on in a nearby apartment, but it's not him.  She goes on impulse across the snowy New York laneway in her pajamas and a trenchcoat with slippers to the apartment building, she rings buzzers but finds that 'she can love him much better than this - it's better this way' - meaning she knows that for Ricky's sake she can't see him.  She goes home, sitting in a chair in front of the bed with Michael asleep and watches him, silently crying as she hugs herself.  The bed is cold without Jeremy.

One day, they see each other across the interior of an over-crowded subway train, forced to face one another, it's like a light is turned on inside of them and when they step outside they stream through the crowd to one another.  He runs to her and finds he can’t have enough of her.  He takes her to his new place where they make love, he promises to find someway to convince her husband to finally sign the papers and leave, because he wants to be with her and Ricky.

Jeremy, who has been closely watching Ricky to make sure he makes it home safe from school every day when Michael isn't around and coveting small visits with him still - sees him being bullied while in the company of Michael.  Michael doesn't do anything - goading him to fight for himself.  Jeremy is appauled and runs across the road to help defend Ricky.  Infuriated, he and Micheal get into a scuffle over Ricky and soon the cops come to take them away.  While Michael tries to press charges against Jeremy, he says he's Melanie's husband, Jeremy also says he's Melanie's husband.  The police are confused, so they call Melanie in to straighten things out.  When she comes in, she finds out what happened.  They ask her to settle the matter once and for all.  Looking at Jeremy behind bars, their eyes meet.  She knows she risks losing her boy is she tells the truth but she can't deny how much she loves Jeremy and so she confesses to the cops that Jeremy is her husband, and so is Michael - but Jeremy is her 'real' husband.

The cops are warning her, she looks at them and says "Put me in jail if you want for bigamy, but let him out!"  Finally, they tell her they will press charges and reprimand her to court the next week.

Melanie, through assistance with legal authorities, family and friends manage to get her husband to finally sign the papers giving her her freedom, because of the fact he doesn't want the legal or financial hassles of a lengthy trial.  He also gives up Ricky.  So now – Jeremy and Melanie remarry and remain together for each other and Ricky, whom Jeremy adopts as his own.