after a quick narration by director stabile, as well as a flash forward, the film's plot begins with zane, mikey, ray, and chicken spending a saturday night in ray's basement. throughout the film, the backgrounds of the four young men are explained by stabile during scenes which pertain to the respected characters the most: ray's parents died while he was young, which left him to be raised by his older brother mark. their upbringing together was bitter and would result in violent tendencies to grow between them. zane grew up without a father, and had trouble staying in schools before ultimately being kicked out of his mother's house due to his behavior. chicken developed drug habits at an early age as a result of witnessing the murder of his older brother, and his mother abandoned him when he was 15. mikey, who experienced his parent's miserable marriage firsthand, was often humiliated and abused by the rest of the group and had at least two previous instances in which he attempted to commit suicide.