Limbo is a 1999 drama film written, produced, edited, and directed by American independent filmmaker John Sayles. The drama features Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, David Strathairn, Vanessa Martinez and Kris Kristofferson. It is the first theatrical film to be released and distributed by Screen Gems. Plot Port Henry, Alaska, is a town undergoing stress as the local economy switches from an industrial one based on the canning and paper industries towards a tourism-based model. Joe Gastineau is a former high school basketball star and fisherman who quit fishing after some undisclosed tragedy. He now works as a handyman, particularly for Frannie and Lou, a lesbian couple who own the local resort hotel. Joe is friends with teenager Noelle De Angelo who also works for Frankie and Lou. At an event which they are working, Noelle's mother Donna, a lounge singer, breaks up with her live in boyfriend and asks Joe for help in moving. The two become close and eventually begin a romantic relationship. Meanwhile, Joe gets the chance to return to fishing when Frankie and Lou ask him to work a fishing boat which they have acquired as collateral from local fisherman Harmon. Donna has a strained relationship with her daughter Noelle, due mainly to Noelle's disapproval of her mother's lifestyle. This is exacerbated when Donna begins dating Joe, who Noelle had a crush on. Donna overhears the story of why Joe quit fishing: he had been involved in a deadly sinking which claimed the lives of all of his boatmates, including the brother of local bush pilot and small-time criminal "Smilin Jack" Johannson. When Joe's dissolute half-brother Bobby shows up, he asks Joe to help crew his boat to pick up a client. Joe brings along Donna and Noelle. They dock for the night in an isolated bay and Bobby reveals the truth: he is involved in marijuana smuggling and had dumped a load overboard when he was spooked by the police. Now they are going to meet Bobby's partners to settle his debt. That night, men sneak onto the boat and kill Bobby. Joe, Donna, and Noelle flee to a nearby island where the men begin to hunt them. They take shelter in an abandoned cabin and try to survive. As they do they grow closer and Noelle finds a diary written by a teenage girl who had lived in the cabin with her family. She spends the