The story follows the title characters from the time they meet in Chicago just before sharing a cross-country drive, through twelve years of chance encounters in New York City. The film addresses but fails to resolve questions along the lines of "Can men and women ever just be friends?"In a scene featuring the two title characters having lunch at Katz's Delicatessen in Manhattan. The New York Times referred to her as the woman "who delivered one of the most memorably funny lines in movie history".