The Night Visitor 1971

Salem [Max von Sydow] is an inmate of an insane asylum, forced to plead insanity after being wrongly convicted of murdering a farmhand. After two years of confinement, Salem escapes from the fortress-like asylum in the dead of winter and heads for the family farm, which is now run by his younger sisters Emmie [Hanne Bork] and Ester Jenks [Liv Ullmann], and Ester’s husband, Dr Anton Jenks [Per Oscarsson], who had accused Salem of the murder. For revenge, Salem kills the people he believes responsible for his confinement. He starts with Emmie, arranging the murder to appear as if Anton is the killer. He also kills Britt [Lotte Freddie], a girl he was with on the night of the murder who could have provided his alibi but refused to do so. He then returns to the asylum, not having been missed.

A local police inspector [Trevor Howard] resolves to uncover the truth of Salem’s conviction. Anton, meanwhile, insists that he saw Salem at the site of Emma’s murder. But, as far as the inspector can tell, escape from the asylum is a physical impossibility.

Even so, Salem does it again the following night, this time with a corrupt barrister named Mr Clemens [Rupert Davies] in his sights. Following a visit from the inspector, the bedridden Clemens has called Anton to his home, confronting him about their collusion during the trial. Anton leaves after giving Clemens a harmless sedative, but then Salem enters and kills the lawyer in his sleep by administering a lethal injection.

Salem proceeds to the farmhouse. There he acquires a coat, biding his time as Ester talks to the inspector. After the police leave, Ester is cornered in the barn and hacked to pieces by Salem when she attempts to flee. When Anton arrives, Salem wipes the blood-smeared axe on the doctor’s clothes, just as Anton had pinned the farmhand’s murder on Salem two years earlier. Salem then heads back to the asylum. Descending into madness, Anton confesses his crime to the inspector, prompting the latter to rush to the asylum.

By the narrowest of margins, Salem manages to return to his cell before the inspector can get there. But, at the last moment, his alibi is ruined in a completely unexpected way.