Sophie Ward

Louise is stuck in an English girls' boarding school. Her only consolation is Matthew, the American art teacher and husband of the headmistress. At half term break, Louise stays behind for some anatomy homework with Matthew. 18-year-old Louise is stuck in a run-down girls' boarding school in the heart of the English countryside. Her only consolation, during the long cold nights, is Matthew, the American art teacher and second husband of the headmistress, Veronica Van Huet. Trouble is, half term is looming and Louise cannot bear the thought of being away from her lover for a whole week. So she persuades Veronica to let her remain at school, ostensibly to do extra study for her exams. The holiday begins and the vast Victorian building is a spooky shell without the other pupils. Louise and Matthew grab the first opportunity to be together, but in their haste expose in every way their intimate relationship. Veronica, despite her considerable hurt and anger, does not expel Louise from the school, as she is acutely aware that her husband is the one truly responsible. She is also keen not to have a row with Matthew as she needs him now more than ever. In a conspiracy with the school's doctor, Veronica and Matthew are planning a major art fraud in a desperate attempt to raise money to save the school. But marital harmony is short-lived when Veronica discovers something far more painful about her husband's love for Louise... —Merlin Ward / <merlin@creativewizard.com> 18-year-old Louise is stuck in a run-down girls' boarding school and can't bear the thought of being away from her lover, Matthew, during the half term break. So she stays on at school, ostensibly to do extra work for her exams. But when Matthew's wife, Veronica, who is also the school's headmistress, finds out about the affair, she is driven over the edge and stabs him. Veronica gets rid of Louise by sending her off on an errand while she hides Matthew's body. When Louise returns, she is shocked to find Matthew gone. According to Veronica, she and Matthew need a little time apart to heal their marriage. Trapped in the remote school and haunted by nightmares, Louise finds the vast Victorian building a spooky shell without the other pupils. Late one night, she is awakened by Matthew calling up to her from outside her bedroom window. Scared and excited, Louise rushes to meet him, but it is only as his arms encircle her that she realises her eyes were deceived, and with fatal consequences. —Merlin Ward <merlin@creativewizard.com>

This guy kills this old lady. Then he turns himself in.

A man becomes obsessed with vengeance when his soul mate marries another man. Heathcliff is Cathy Earnshaw's foster brother; more than that, he is her other half. When forces within and without tear them apart, Heathcliff wreaks vengeance on those he holds responsible, even into a second generation. —Cleo <frede005@maroon.tc.umn.edu> The love that exists between Cathy and Heathcliff is told, that love which began upon first sight in the late eighteenth century when Cathy's father, Mr. Earnshaw, brought Heathcliff into their farmhouse called Wuthering Heights on the side of the English moors to live, when both Cathy and Heathcliff were adolescents. Mr. Earnshaw found Heathcliff, assumed to be orphaned, on the streets of Liverpool. Heathcliff's status as the favored one in the house changed upon Mr. Earnshaw's death, with the new head of household, Cathy's older brother Hindley relegating Heathcliff to the role of servant, most specifically stable boy, Heathcliff who was now banished to live in the stables as opposed to the house. Cathy and Heathcliff's want to be together in love, as they grew into young adulthood, was affected largely by meeting brother and sister Edgar and Isabella Linton who lived in nearby grand Thrushcross Grange, the Lintons who lived in a higher social class. The question as the years go on is whether Cathy and Heathcliff's love can endure against the obstacles which they and others have placed in front of them. —Huggo

Teenagers Sherlock Holmes (Nicholas Rowe) and John Watson (Alan Cox) meet and become good friends as students at London's prestigious Brompton Academy at the height of the Victorian era. Holmes has remarkable powers of observation and prides himself on guessing people's names & where they are from just by observing them keenly. Meanwhile, a hooded figure uses a blowpipe to shoot Bentley Bobster (Patrick Newell) and Reverend Duncan Nesbitt (Donald Eccles) with hallucinogenic thorns, the effects of which lead to their deaths. Bobster has a meal at a restaurant (when he hallucinates that the bird he is eating has come alive and is attacking him). Bobster returns home and locks himself inside his first-floor room, and he jumps out of the window when he imagines the room attacking him and set itself on fire. Reverend Duncan Nesbitt was alone in church at night when he hallucinates that the knights from the tinted windows have come alive and are attacking him. Nesbitt runs out of church and is trampled by a horse carriage. Watson is introduced to Holmes' mentor, Rupert T. Waxflatter (Nigel Stock), a retired schoolmaster and inventor. Waxflatter is an eccentric retired professor to whom the school has given a large attic space for his inventions, which include a flying machine. Waxflatter had already written 27 books and is considered a genius. His machine has a bicycle pedal which flaps the wings and provides lift to the craft. Holmes finds a newspaper article circled on Waxflatter's death announcing Bobster's death. A mysterious man comes to meet Waxflatter (whom we later learn was Craigwitch). Waxflatter's niece Elizabeth (Sophie Ward) is also Holmes' close friend and love interest, and Holmes competes for her affections with fellow student Dudley (Earl Rhodes), though she shows a marked preference for Holmes. Holmes suspects foul play in the deaths of Bobster and Nesbitt (as both men graduated from the same university in 1809, and the manner of their deaths did not match their personality) but is rebuffed by Scotland Yard policeman Lestrade (Roger Ashton-Griffiths) when he suggests a connection between the deaths. Holmes is unjustly expelled from the Academy due to Dudley's machinations. During an exam, Dudley throws a note at Homles' feet and when he picks it up, the teacher spots him and accuses him of cheating. Before he leaves, Holmes has one last match with his fencing instructor Professor Rathe (Anthony Higgins) but loses after becoming distracted by a light reflected from Rathe's ring. The mysterious hooded figure strikes again, shooting Waxflatter with a hallucinogenic thorn, causing him to stab himself as he fends off imagined gargoyles. As he dies, Waxflatter's last words to Holmes are "Eh-Tar." Holmes secretly meets with Watson and Elizabeth and begins his investigation of the murders. Piecing together the clues - a jingling-bell sound made by the killer, a piece of cloth, and the blowpipe dropped at Waxflatter's murder scene - the trio uncover the existence of Rame Tep, an ancient Egyptian cult of Osiris worshipers. The cult's main weapons were blowpipes, used to shoot thorns dipped into a solution which cause the victim to experience realistic, nightmare-like hallucinations. Their investigation then leads to a paraffin warehouse of Froggit and Froggit, a Wapping-area manufacturer, where they discover a modern-day revival of the Rame Tep cult conducting their service inside a wooden-pyramid-reconstruction hidden in the warehouse. When Holmes interrupts the ceremonial sacrifice of a young girl, the three are attacked and shot with thorns by the worshipers. It is only through Holmes' endurance and the intervention of a graveyard caretaker that they're able to survive the hallucinations and their pursuers. The following evening, at Waxflatter's loft, Holmes and Watson discover a picture of the three victims and a fourth man, Chester Cragwitch (Freddie Jones). Unfortunately, Rathe and school nurse Mrs. Dribb (Susan Fleetwood) catch and separate them, preparing to expel Watson and Elizabeth in the morning. The three escape their sleeping quarters and Elizabeth returns to the loft to salvage her uncle's work. Holmes and Watson locate Mr. Cragwitch who explains that in his youth, he and the other five men were in Egypt, where they looted an underground pyramid containing the tombs of five Egyptian princesses. This was the underground pyramid of Rame Tep where they planned to build a hotel. Their find led to an angry uprising by the local populace which was violently put down by the British Army; one boy, Eh-Tar, who along with his sister lost their parents in the uprising, swore revenge. Eh-Tar vows to replace the bodies of the five princesses with the bodies of the men who desecrated the tomb. Craigwitch is then poisoned by the hooded figure's thorn and suddenly attacks Holmes but is subdued by Inspector LeStrade, who came after reconsidering the evidence presented by Holmes. As they return to campus, Holmes realizes that Rathe is Eh-Tar, but he and Watson arrive too late to stop Rathe and his sister Mrs. Dribb (Susan Fleetwood) (ostensibly the school nurse) from abducting Elizabeth. Using Waxflatter's self-propelled, heavier-than-air flying machine, they travel to the warehouse just in time to prevent Rathe from sacrificing Elizabeth, setting the cult's pyramid temple afire. As Rathe escapes with Elizabeth, Mrs Dribb is killed in a fight with Holmes. Watson successfully thwarts Rathe's escape by sabotaging his carriage. Rathe then tries to shoot Holmes, but Elizabeth intervenes and takes the shot instead. Enraged, Holmes duels Rathe and manages to get the better of him when Rathe falls through the frozen River Thames. Holmes returns to Elizabeth's side and caresses her as she dies. Afterwards, as he exchanges goodbyes with Watson, Holmes explains how he figured the identity of Rathe and Dribb, who are actually Eh-Tar and his sister, with Watson pointing out that Rathe is Eh-Tar spelled backwards - a clue that Holmes had failed to notice. Holmes transfers to another school and Watson gives him an antique pipe that he bought during the investigations as a Christmas/farewell present. As Holmes leaves by horse carriage, Watson expresses per voice-over (by his older, adult self-reminiscing) that he would long for yet more adventures at Holmes' side. Sometime later, Rathe is revealed to be alive; he checks himself into an inn as "Moriarty", making him Holmes' arch-nemesis.