 In Fort Dupre, South Dakota, in 1959, Kit Carruthers, a twenty-five-year-old garbageman, starts courting fifteen-year-old Holly Sargis. Holly, who reads pop music and movie magazines, is infatuated with Kit. She thinks he looks like actor James Dean. But her widower father, a sign painter, shoots her dog when he finds out she s been seeing Kit, and forbids him to come near her. While Holly watches with mixed emotions, Kit kills her father with a pistol. They burn down the house and take off on a killing spree throughout the Midwest.