Based on the acclaimed short-story collection by celebrated Mississippi writer Larry Brown, "Big Bad Love" is the directing debut of actor Arliss Howard ("Full Metal Jacket," "A Map Of The World"). From a script by Howard and his brother James, it is a tale of Viet Nam veteran Barlow (Arliss Howard) struggling to make fiction from his past, his dreams, and the dim sound of the future bearing down on him.

In the North Mississippi hill country, Barlow struggles to balance his need to create with what he has created; an ex-wife (Debra Winger) who followed him from the rehab-ilitation ward of a Northern Hospital, a son on the verge of adolescence, a small daughter with an incurable illness, a war buddy and best friend (Paul Le Mat) puzzling over his own consuming love for a funeral home heiress (Rosanna Arquette), and a mother (Angie Dickinson) who sees in her son the return and demise of her beloved husband all over again.