Dark Plums is Maria Espinosa's exploration of a young woman's search for love and self in Manhattan. Set in the late 1950s, Adrianne, a young girl from Texas, wanders the city and has sex indiscriminately with strangers. Her relationship with a Cuban-American artist, Alfredo, leads to further degradation as she agrees to work as a hooker in order to support his work as a painter. His treatment of her becomes increasingly brutal, and her suffering becomes so intense that she breaks down. But she ultimately emerges with the strength to leave him.