The woman is Penny, an aspiring model turned prostitute played by Michele Hicks in the film Twin Falls Idaho. The filmmaking team of Mark and Michael Polish plays the conjoined twins, Blake and Francis Falls, who have hired Penny as a birthday treat. When Francis, the weaker twin, gets sick, Penny's initial revulsion toward the pair turns to curiosity and then to compassion as she develops a romantic attachment to Blake.

Twin Falls Idaho is the Polish brothers' first film, and it has some of the raw, grating edges of a low-budget debut. The pace is somnambulant, which may be meant to cover for the frail, small-voiced performances given by all the principles. Also, much of the imagery and symbolism in the film is thuddingly blatant--two-dollar bills and chopsticks pulled apart are meant to cue the audience to the Falls' inherent value as a matched set.

But as much as we may be impatient for the characters to speak up and tell us more about themselves, we're all the more intrigued by the mystery surrounding the Falls' appearance in Penny's city (which seems to be New York), and what secrets they may be telling when they whisper to each other. The Polish brothers play up the squalor of their characters' fleabag hotel to underscore that even in a landscape of freaks, the Falls are marked as a spectacle--an idea that is further developed in the film's magnificent centerpiece. At a Halloween party where the duo's condition could be mistaken for one fabulous costume, Blake and Francis are still cautious, stuck to each other, and out of place. Even when the main plot underwhelms us, Twin Falls Idaho is still curiously insinuating, as we scrutinize this one body for two men and try to understand why they don't make even the simplest effort to fit in.