Diane Baker

In a stand off in a busy city, a man threatens to kill himself, Detective Regis intervenes and stops the man, Detective Regis's team get the gun away from the man, turns out the gun was on safety. In the Orval office a man and woman are shown having sex. In a restroom in the White House in Washington D.C., a janitor finds the body of White House secretary Carla Town (Mary Moore). Homicide detective Harlan Regis (Wesley Snipes), whose apartment block is awaiting demolition in favor of a parking lot, is put on the case. At the White House, Regis is introduced to secret service chief Nick Spikings (Daniel Benzali), national security advisor Alvin Jordan (Alan Alda), and secret service agent Nina Chance (Diane Lane). Spikings assigns Nina to keep an eye on Regis. On the next day, after Regis checks out the White House, Nina tells him that she won a gold medal for sharpshooting in the 1988 Olympics. Regis and Nina discover that Carla had an appointment in New York City, and a flight from New York to the Virgin Islands, with no intention of returning to the USA. Coroner Jimmy Foley (Richard Blackburn) tells Regis and Nina that whoever had sex with Carla on the night of the murder used a condom, and left absolutely no DNA. Regis is told that White House janitor Cory Allen Luchessi (Tony Nappo) was unaccounted for on the night of the murder. Cory is questioned, and his words lead Regis to suspect that the secret service might be involved. That night, a man breaks into Regis's apartment, and tries to kill him. Whoever is behind the murder has bugged Regis's house, and is eavesdropping on everyone. In a picture of Carla, Regis sees secret service agent Burton Cash (Nigel Bennett), who is in charge of Kyle Neil (Tate Donovan), the son of president Jack Neil (Ronny Cox) and first lady Kitty Neil (Diane Baker). Jack has been trying to deal with a situation where Americans are being held hostage in North Korea, and some people think Jack is not handling it the right way. Some people think Jack should send troops to North Korea to rescue the hostages, but Jack does not want to risk a potential second Korean War. Regis figures out that it was Kyle who had sex with Carla on the night of the murder. Spikings forbids Nina to have any more contact with Regis. At a dance club, Regis talks to a young woman who says that Kyle once bragged that he shared Carla with Jack. Carla's uncle's company, Brookline Associates, is Jack's leading East coast fundraiser, and Brookline also owns the apartment that Carla lived in. Regis discovers that Nina used to be the agent assigned to Kyle. That night, Regis goes to Nina's house, and asks her why she never told him that she used to be the agent on Kyle's detail. Nina explains that one night, she heard noises coming from Kyle's apartment, went in, and found Kyle beating up his girlfriend. That's when Nina asked to be reassigned. Nina was replaced by Burton Cash, and the secret service covered up the beating for Kyle so he wouldn't get arrested. On the next day, Spikings sends Agent Cooper (Tom Wright) to look for Nina, who successfully avoids Cooper. During a meeting at the White House, General Clark Tully (Harris Yulin) urges Jack to take action, and send troops to North Korea to rescue the hostages, but Jack declines, prompting Tully to call Jack a criminal. Jack tells Tully to submit his resignation. That night, Nina tells Regis that Carla had an appointment in New York with Craig Nisker & Associates, who have sold 5 of the top 10 scandal memoirs of all time, and they know that the appointment would be a good motive for Kyle to kill Carla. Later that night, Nina and Regis meet at a restaurant, where Nina tells Regis that she has discovered that Jack and Kitty were in the White House at the time of the murder, not at Camp David like they said they were. Jack would have the same motive that Kyle would have. Upon being confronted by Regis, Kyle denies that he killed Carla, but he provides some information: among the bookings she made, Carla supposedly also ordered a car -- despite not having a driver's license. Nina has rented a hotel room to keep the secret service from finding her, but they do anyway, and Nina and Regis escape out the back door of the building. On the next day, Regis and Nina discover that Carla's appointment book was forged, and she never had any appointments. With some clues left by Jordan, Regis finds that Spikings has withheld several surveillance tapes from the night of the murder. Regis goes to Spikings' residence to question him; Spikings is willing to show the tapes to Regis, but Spikings is suddenly killed by a sniper. However, Regis and Nina escape with the tape. Later that day, Regis and Nina learn that Jordan is the killer, and Jordan has now framed Regis and Nina. Jordan engineered Carla Town's murder, hoping to get Jack accused of it, and force Jack into resigning, which would allow vice president Gordon Dylan (Chris Gillett) to assume office. Jordan, enraged that the hostages haven't been rescued, knows that Dylan would not be afraid to send troops to North Korea to rescue the hostages, and Jordan believes that Jack's refusal to send troops to North Korea to rescue the hostages makes Jack unfit to be president. Regis, Nina, and Regis's partner Stengel (Dennis Miller) enter the White House tunnels while Jordan still tries to make sure Dylan can take over as president. In the tunnels, Carl (Cliff McMullen), the sniper who killed Spikings for Jordan, shoots Stengel, and Nina kills Carl. Pursued by the Secret Service, Regis just barely manages to get in contact with Jack, and present him with the evidence of Jordan's conspiracy. Nina and Regis are grabbed, and in a hallway in the White House, there is a confrontation in which Jordan tries to shoot Jack, only for his shot to be intercepted by a handcuffed Nina, and Secret Service agents fatally shoot Jordan. Nina and Stengel are taken to a hospital, where they recover from their injuries. In gratitude for his rescue, Jack promises Regis that he'll look into the commission that bought Regis's building and wants to destroy it.

After moving to a new apartment, Steven finds his cable guy wants to be his friend and won`t take no for an answer, leaving him with a new best friend he can`t get rid of.

A computer analyst`s quiet life is changed after a top-secret computer program falls into her hands, a colleague has a mysterious plane crash and her identity is stolen.

The story opens as a woman with dark hair, seen only from behind, carries a suitcase along a train platform. The yellow purse tucked under her arm is presented at such an angle that it is suggestive of female genitalia. In the next scene, outraged business owner Sidney Strutt (Martin Gabel) rants to a pair of detectives that he was "cleaned out" by a female employee named Marion Holland whom he obviously hired for her looks despite her lack of professional references. A client of Strutt's, Mark Rutland (Sean Connery), overhears the conversation and says that he remembers this woman, wryly referring to her as "the brunette with the legs." The woman, real name Marnie Edgar (Tippi Hedren) is a compulsive thief, and has made off with almost $10,000 stashed in the yellow purse. She changes her appearance, going from brunette to blonde, and flees with the cash, journeying south to a town in Virginia where she keeps her beloved horse, Forio, stabled. She then visits her mother Bernice (Louise Latham) in Baltimore. She lavishes her mother with expensive gifts in an attempt to impress her and win her love, but the woman is cold and distant with Marnie, showing much more maternal affection towards a little neighbor girl named Jessie whom she babysits. Marnie's intense jealousy of Jessie seems inappropriate for a grown woman to express, and along with her panic over a bouquet of red gladiolas and her mother's insistence that "decent" women don't need men, the first hints of the dysfunction that drives Marnie to lie and steal appear. Time goes by and Marnie constructs a new identity, Mary Taylor, with the intent to run her scam again on another victim. She applies for a job at a printing company in Philadelphia owned by none other than Mark Rutland. Despite her now chestnut hair, he recognizes Marnie as the woman who stole from Strutt, but, excited by the thrill of chasing and capturing the attractive criminal, he hires her. Marnie robs Rutland, too, but he anticipated this outcome and manages to track Marnie down. Instead of handing her over to the police, he blackmails her into marrying him. On their honeymoon, which takes place aboard a cruise ship, Mark finds out about Marnie's frigidity. At first, he respects her wishes, but soon obsessed with controlling and dominating Marnie, he rapes her. The next morning, she tries to commit suicide by drowning herself in a pool aboard the ship, but Mark finds her in time to resuscitate her. In addition to Marnie's aversion to sex and generally troubled behavior, Mark's marriage faces a challenge from Lil (Diane Baker), the sister of his deceased first wife who clearly had designs on him and views Marnie as a rival she can overthrow. Upon learning that Mark has bought Strutt's silence by paying off the money Marnie stole, Lil invites Strutt to a party at the house. Strutt recognizes Marnie, the former "Marion Holland" who outfoxed and humiliated him, but grudgingly keeps quiet about her crime when Rutland threatens to take his business elsewhere and convince other clients to do the same. Meanwhile Marnie takes Forio out on their first fox hunt. As the hounds descend upon the fox in a snarling pack, Marnie sees the bright red jacket of one of the hunters; the combination of the violent scene and the color triggers Marnie's own fight-or-flight response. She charges away into the woods at a mad gallop. She loses control of Forio and can't rein him in when he heads for a high stone wall. The horse breaks both of his front legs against the wall and crashes to the other side in agony. Marnie is forced to shoot Forio to put the animal out of his misery, an act that ruptures her already fragile state of mind. Still armed with the gun she used to kill her horse, she heads for the Rutland safe. She's driven to repeat her usual modus operandi-- steal from Mark and run away, but by putting Marnie in a position where she already owns anything she might ordinarily be tempted to steal, Mark has frustrated her compulsive desires. Marnie breaks down in a welter of neurotic conflict. Mark attempts to discover the root of Marnie's compulsions, nightmares and odd phobias: of thunderstorms, of men and of the color red. He takes Marnie to her mother's house in Baltimore where he demands an explanation of the "bad accident" Bernice suffered. He knows from reading reports of the incident that Bernice made her living as a prostitute whose main clientele were the sailors that frequented Baltimore's shipyards. Marnie relives the night when she was six years old and one of her mother's clients (Bruce Dern) approached Marnie as she cowered on the sofa, frightened by a thunderstorm. Bernice reacted to the sight of the drunken sailor caressing her daughter by attacking him frantically. Seeing her mother struggling with the man, Marnie struck him on the head with a fireplace poker, killing him. The blood spouting from his head wound to drench his white uniform led to her fear of the color red. Bernice explains that she became pregnant with Marnie as a teen after she'd been lured into having sex by the promise of her date's basketball sweater, and tells her daughter that she claimed responsibility for the sailor's death and fought to keep the authorities from placing Marnie in a foster home because Marnie's the only thing she ever really loved. Relieved of the repressed traumatic memories that poisoned her subconscious, Marnie believes that she is capable of renouncing crime and sustaining an intimate relationship. She and Mark ride back to his family estate.

Various flashbacks and images introduce Lucy Harbin [Joan Crawford], a young woman who comes home unexpectedly to find her husband in bed with another woman. Carol, their very young daughter, is in bed right in the next room, but she is awake. Heartbroken, Lucy suffers a moment of fury and confusion that leads her to spontaneously pick up a nearby axe and decapitate her husband and his lover while they sleep. Carol watches in terror and shock as Lucy hacks the two bodies to pieces. Lucy is declared insane and sent to an asylum, where she endures traumatic shock treatments for her mental breakdown. The narrator of the flashback is revealed to be Carol, now a young woman. It is twenty years later, and Carol is opening up about her past to her boyfriend, Michael Fields. After Lucy's incarceration, Carol was taken in by her aunt and uncle, Bill and Emily, and the family lives on a farm in a rural location. Carol is revealing the family history to Michael because Lucy is being released from the asylum, and is coming to live with the family. When Lucy arrives, she is skittish. She cautiously acclimates to the farm, exploring the area with Carol and meeting the gritty-looking farm hand, Krause. But she is clearly thrilled to see Carol again, and is touched by the lovely young woman Carol has become. Carol is a sculptress and has a spacious studio filled with her work, and she thrills Lucy by giving her a bust of herself just as she was in her youth. Things quickly start to get strange. Carol shocks Lucy by presenting her with two bracelets she used to wear when she was a young woman, large dangling charm bracelets that jangle when she walks. Carol seems intent on recreating Lucy as a young woman, taking her clothes shopping and buying her a wig that mimics the hairstyle she wore the last time Carol saw her. Lucy is uncomfortable with this, but agrees to dress this way to please her daughter, whom she desperately wants to make amends with. While they are in the wig shop, Lucy hears strange voices, as if children are singing a morbid nursery rhyme about her crimes. She dismisses it as nerves. Later, she suffers a terrible nightmare and wakes up to discover two bloody heads in bed with her, with a bloody axe lying nearby. When she wakes the others, the items are gone from her room. Lucy starts to think she is relapsing. Things get worse when Carol attempts to introduce Michael to her mother. When Michael stops by for drinks, Lucy seems to try and seduce him, all with Carol right there in the room. The embarassing scene is interrupted by Lucy's former psychiatrist, Dr. Anderson, who makes an unexpected visit. When he sees how unstable Lucy seems, Dr. Anderson makes comments to the family that suggest he would like to take Lucy back to the hospital. When the doctor gets Lucy alone, his comments upset her and she runs off. As Dr. Anderson searches for her around the farm, he enters the darkened barn and a shadowy figure corners him--it appears to be Lucy, the silhouette revealing her hairstyle and figure, right down to the jangling bracelets she wears. The figure is holding an axe, and quickly decapitates Dr. Anderson. Carol returns to the farmhouse to find her mother alone in the darkened living room. The doctor's car is still outside, and Carol quickly comes to the conclusion that her mother has killed him. In a panic, Carol drives the doctor's car into a barn and locks it in, but she is spotted by Krause, who is lurking the shadows. The next day, Carol sees Krause painting the car a different color and angrily confronts him, but he smugly suggests that he knows what happened to the doctor, and that he'll turn Lucy in to the authorities if Carol fires him. Lucy overhears the conversation from the window. Later that evening, Krause is stalked and murdered with the axe. Lucy prepares for an evening that she dreads, a dinner party intended to introduce her to Michael's parents. If Michael and Carol are to be married, these will be their in-laws, and Michael's family is very wealthy, his father being the proprietor of a very successful dairy farm. Lucy has a panic attack in the powder room while at the Fields'--after spilling coffee on her dress, she retreats to the washroom and suffers a flashback because of the wallpaper, which resembles the bars of a prison cell. Carol calms her down and takes her back to the party. Mr. & Mrs. Fields are cordial until they plot to get Lucy alone so they can have a private conversation with her: Mrs. Fields is suspicious of Lucy, and poor Lucy makes a terrible misstep by revealing to Mr. & Mrs. Fields that her daughter and Michael are planning to be married. The Fields had not been informed of this yet, and they react disapprovingly. Mrs. Fields in particular gets very haughty with Lucy, making suggestions about her past, and Lucy suddenly snaps at her, revealing that she was in an asylum for twenty years. She says that under no circumstances will she allow the Fields' to interfere with her daughter's happiness, and she storms out of the house. Michael drives Emily and Carol back to their house while he and Bill go out looking for Lucy, who has disappeared. Emily sends Carol to bed, but Carol is restless and cannot sleep. With Michael gone from the Fields' house, Mr. and Mrs. Fields are alone in their house and they hear sounds to suggest someone is prowling around. Mr. Fields is oblivious, but when he goes into his closet to get undressed for the evening, he is attacked by the figure of Lucy, brandishing an axe. Mrs. Fields becomes suspicious and goes looking for her husband, eventually finding his body in the dressing room. Horrified, she retreats, only to be confronted by the figure of Lucy in the bedroom. Before the axe can fall, the bedroom door opens and the real Lucy comes in; after scuffling with the other figure, Lucy tears off a mask to reveal her daughter's face underneath. Carol has been committing the murders while dressing as her mother; scarred by witnessing the double homicide committed by her mother, Carol's mind was unstable ever since. Certain that Mr. and Mrs. Fields would never allow Michael to marry her without a great deal of trouble, she plotted to make it appear as if Lucy murdered them in a rage, which would send Lucy back to the asylum and allow her to marry Michael. Her mind shattered, Carol clutches the mask of her mother and screams at it "I hate you! I hate you! Oh I'm sorry, I love you! I hate you! I love you!" Outside on the porch, Lucy hears her daughter's insane ravings and weeps, perhaps remembering her own moment of insanity. An epilogue reveals Lucy discussing her plans with Bill. With Carol now committed to an asylum just as she once was, Lucy intends to stand by her daughter and be whatever kind of support that she needs.