Alex Dall, a freshman college student with a physics major, becomes obsessed with success on the rowing team. In spite of her plummeting physics grades, Alex pushes herself to succeed at rowing, no matter the cost, annoying her fellow rowers and their instructors while increasingly also worrying her girlfriend. It's soon revealed that Alex is deeply troubled, with her goal consuming her as she's utterly determined to beat the opposing teams and also break a rowing record.
Tropes:
- Bathtub Scene: Alex is shown in the tub multiple times. This is not played for fanservice at all given it shows her struggling against stress and with scars from cutting herself on her torso.
- Boyish Short Hair: Dani has short, very curly hair as one part of her Butch Lesbian looks.
- Butch Lesbian: Dani wears tanktops with pants most of the time, has Boyish Short Hair and sees Alex, another woman. She's the most masculine of any woman in the film.
- Determinator: Alex is absolutely set on succeeding in rowing, and surpassing everyone else, no matter what stress it causes her or even injury.
- Fan Disservice: Alex is shown topless from the back and side but this is more disturbing than anything else as it shows her either cutting herself, showcases scars from her previous Self-Harm or she's in the midst of obvious intense stress.
- Lesbian Jock: Alex is totally committed to rowing. She hooks up with a guy in the film early on, then dates Dani, a Butch Lesbian, for longer.
- Lousy Lovers Are Losers: Alex complains of how poorly the man she'd had sex with performed, as he went quite fast and didn't even manage to keep the condom on, with her having to fish this out inside her. It's made clear this marks him as an unacceptable lover in her eyes.
- Making Love in All the Wrong Places: Implied when Alex and Dani meet again after they first slept together. Alex notes Dani said she won't date her students. Dani replies Alex isn't a student of hers any more, opens the door to the bathroom and goes in. She leaves it open for Alex, who goes in after her.
- Masculine–Feminine Gay Couple: Alex, a bisexual woman, has fairly average looks and dates Butch Lesbian Dani.
- Passionate Sports Girl: Alex is extremely into rowing, to the point that it's self-destructive. She's dead set on being the best, no matter what. It's so much her girlfriend breaks off their relationship since she can't stand to see Alex harm herself doing this.
- Queer Establishing Moment: Alex has sex with a man in the film early on. Then she and Dani, who's a Butch Lesbian, flirt, later sleep together and begin dating, revealing she's into women too.
- Self-Harm: Alex cuts herself repeatedly on her torso, apparently to handle stress. She does this explicitly during the film, and has many old scars as well.
- Tanktop Tomboy: Dani has a Tomboyish Name, is a Butch Lesbian, and she wears tanktops usually.
- Teacher/Student Romance: Alex and Dani, her TA, flirt before having sex later. Dani won't actually date her when she's teaching Alex however, only doing so after she's not in her class.
- Tomboyish Name: Dani, a Butch Lesbian, has this.
- Twofer Token Minority: Dani, a Butch Lesbian who is of unclear ethnicity with olive skin and dark brown curly hair (played by a Dominican-American actress). She's the only person of color in the film.
- Vapor Wear: Alex fantasizes of Dani rowing as she's wearing a wet tanktop without any bra under it, which shows her nipples, as Dani's going down on her.
