Night Watch 1973

In London, during a raging thunderstorm one night, Ellen Wheeler frantically tells John Wheeler that from the living-room window she has seen a man with his throat slit in a chair by the window in the large, old, deserted house across the way. John calls the police, but a search of the old house finds no evidence of a murder.

The next morning, Ellen notices a freshly planted bed of Laburnum in the garden next to the old house that was not there before. She calls the investigating detective, Inspector Walker, and suggests that the body of the murder victim she witnessed may be buried there. Mr Appleby confirms that he planted the trees the night before during the storm, but refuses to let the police search the garden or dig up the trees.

Ellen is recovering from a nervous breakdown that occurred after her unfaithful first husband, Carl, was killed a few years earlier in an auto accident with his young paramour, while suffering from recurring nightmares of the accident. After learning that Ellen has called Inspector Walker multiple times about the investigation, John suggests that she see his psychiatrist friend, Tony. Indignant, Ellen continues to insist that she saw a murder in the deserted house, but since there is no proof, John remains sceptical.

Ellen’s visiting friend Sarah Cooke is equally sceptical, suggesting that Ellen sees what she thinks she sees because of her recent breakdown. That night, when both Ellen and Sarah see a light moving behind the old house’s shutters, they call the police, who discover [Mr Appleby] wandering around with a flashlight and arrest him for trespassing. A second search of the house and excavation of the garden reveal nothing, and Inspector Walker privately tells John that the case is officially closed.

That evening, Ellen claims to John and Sarah that she saw another body in the old house, that of a woman. Ellen is then sedated by John and Sarah, who believe that Ellen may be losing her mind. The next day, Ellen agrees to see [Tony] again and, during their conversation, recounts Carl’s fatal car accident. Tony advises her to check into a clinic in Switzerland for a few weeks, to which Ellen agrees. Shortly afterwards, Ellen calls Inspector Walker and urges him to search the old house again. After falsely promising to do so, he reveals that the house was purchased six months earlier by a private company, DIPCO.

The following evening, as Ellen prepares to depart for Switzerland, John asks her to sign several financial documents, including one that grants him power of attorney over their financial holdings. She complies, before noticing in the documents that John had recently acquired DIPCO. Ellen angrily accuses John and Sarah of having an affair and plotting to torment her in order to have her committed, showing him the key to the old house. When John denies Ellen’s accusations, she runs to the old house and lets herself inside using the key; John and Sarah both chase after her. Ellen lures the two to the second-floor room where she claimed to have seen the bodies. There, she slashes John’s throat and stabs Sarah to death, before positioning them in exactly the same manner that she claimed to have seen the two bodies.

It is revealed that Ellen had feigned insanity by claiming to have witnessed two murders in the old house as part of an elaborate scheme to murder both John and Sarah for their affair, and to weary the police with her repeated phone calls in order to dissuade them from investigating the house and finding the bodies of John and Sarah. [Mr Appleby], whose father owned John and Ellen’s house before they purchased it, makes a surprise visit, startling Ellen and congratulating her on pulling off her scheme. He assures her that he does not intend to report the murders, as Inspector Walker would not believe him. Ellen asks [Mr Appleby] to look after her house and the garden until she returns. [Mr Appleby] happily agrees as Ellen bids him goodbye and departs.