As Francis (Friedrich Feher) sits on a bench with an older man who complains that spirits have driven him away from his family and home, a dazed woman named Jane (Lil Dagover) passes them. Francis explains she is his "fiancée" and that they have suffered a great ordeal. Most of the rest of the film is a flashback of Francis' story, which takes place in Holstenwall, a shadowy village of twisted buildings and spiraling streets. Francis and his friend Alan (Hans Heinrich von Twardowski), who are good-naturedly competing for Jane's affections, plan to visit the town fair. Meanwhile, a mysterious man named Dr. Caligari (Werner Krauss) seeks a permit from the rude town clerk to present a spectacle at the fair, which features a somnambulist named Cesare (Conrad Veidt). The clerk mocks and berates Dr. Caligari, but ultimately approves the permit. That night, the clerk is found stabbed to death in his bed.
In the 1930s West Virginia, along the Ohio River, Reverend Harry Powell, a serial killer, flees the scene of his latest victim. Powell is a self-anointed preacher with a penchant for switchblade knives; a misogynist who is both attracted to and repulsed by women. He travels rural roads, preaching in small towns, and seems to believe he is doing God's work. The letters "L-O-V-E" are tattooed on one hand and the letters "H-A-T-E" on the other, which Powell uses as symbols in impromptu sermons. In one small town, police arrest Powell for driving a stolen car and sentence him to jail, unaware that he is a murderer.
Dr. Frederick Frankenstein (Gene Wilder) is a physician lecturer at an American medical school and engaged to the tightly wound socialite Elizabeth (Madeline Kahn). He becomes exasperated when anyone brings up the subject of his grandfather, the infamous mad scientist. To disassociate himself from his forebear, Frederick insists that his surname is pronounced "Fronkensteen."
In 1965, Rosemary Woodhouse (Mia Farrow), a bright but somewhat naive young housewife, and Guy (John Cassavetes), her husband and a struggling actor, move into the Bramford, an antiquated New York City apartment building. The couple learns from the building's manager, Mr. Nicklas (Elisha Cook, Jr.), that their new residence was previously inhabited by Mrs. Gardenia, an elderly woman who had seemingly gone senile. Guy also discovers a dresser concealing a simple closet which contains nothing except a vacuum cleaner and a few other household items. Their friend Hutch (Maurice Evans) tries to dissuade them from taking the apartment, informing them of some of the Bramford's rather unseemly history but, undeterred, Rosemary and Guy move into the building.
"I read the novel in one day, and I thought it was amazing we do not do thrillers and fantasy films in Egypt and I love these genres so I thought this could be the one. I felt very sorry for the characters, especially Yehia Rahed, the main character. I always thought that the “The Blue Elephant” is about performance. I love working with actors and all the characters and their back-stories were really quite interesting. One of the things that grabbed me most was the other world in the film and the journeys that Yehia took."
The Virgin Spring tells the story, set in the late medieval Sweden, of a prosperous Christian whose daughter, Karin (Birgitta Pettersson), is appointed to take candles to the church. Karin is accompanied by her pregnant servant Ingeri (Gunnel Lindblom), who secretly worships the Norse deity Odin. Along their way through the forest on horseback, Ingeri becomes frightened when they come to a stream-side mill and the two part and Karin sets out on her own.
On New Year's Eve, dying Salvation Army Sister Edit has one last wish: to speak with David Holm. David, a drunkard, is sitting in a graveyard, telling his two drinking buddies about his old friend Georges, who told him about the legend that the last person to die each year has to drive Death's carriage and collect the souls of everybody who dies the following year. Georges himself died on New Year's Eve the previous year.
Young Sheffield residents Ruth Beckett (Karen Meagher) and Jimmy Kemp (Reece Dinsdale) decide to marry due to an unplanned pregnancy. Meanwhile, as tensions between the US and the Soviet Union over Iran escalate, the Home Office directs Sheffield City Council to assemble an emergency operations team, which establishes itself in a makeshift bomb shelter in the basement of the Town Hall. After an ignored US ultimatum to the Soviets results in a brief tactical nuclear skirmish, Britain is gripped by fear, with looting and rioting erupting. "Known subversives" (including peace activists and some trade unionists) are arrested and interned under the Emergency Powers Act.
The movie takes place against the backdrop of the political radicalization of Europe during the 1930s, more specifically the demise of the golden era of the First Czechoslovak Republic and the establishment of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia under Nazi Germany. Spiritually, the movie takes place in the aftermath of the death of Thubten Gyatso, the 13th Dalai Lama in 1933.
Michael Karthikeyan (Vijay Sethupathi) is a pizza delivery boy who lives with his girlfriend Anu (Remya Nambeesan). She is an aspiring novelist and is researching for writing a horror story, whereas Michael does not believe in supernatural powers, and is afraid of anything supernatural. Anu, keeps telling him that he would soon realize the presence of supernatural beings. At first, Michael is confused and scared, and his fears are confirmed when he comes to know his boss, i.e., the Pizza restaurant owner Shanmugam's (Naren) daughter is possessed by a spirit. Meanwhile, Anu becomes pregnant, and after a brief altercation, Michael and Anu get covertly married. One particular day, Michael goes out to deliver a pizza to a customer and returns to the restaurant in a state of shock while covered in blood; he is apparently injured, keeps constantly muttering Anu's name, and seems to be worried about her. When his boss questions him, Michael explains that he had been to deliver a pizza to a customer named Smitha (Pooja) in a bungalow and recounts the events that happened at the bungalow.
In the mid-1980s Belgrade finally gets its first serial killer: an awkward carnations seller named Pera Mitić (Taško Načić). Mitić is an overweight 48-year-old man who is in an Oedipus kind of way connected to his aging mother. His mother often punishes him when he does not sell any of the carnation flowers. His punishments include kneeling on nutshells while being slapped by his mother or being locked in the water tank. This is the reason why he starts killing every girl who refuses to buy his flowers. Mitić's character can be compared to Norman Bates's character and relationship with his mother.
The main character Gengobe (Katsuo Nakamura), an exile masterless samurai (Ronin), is facing a moral dilemma: either help a courtesan he loves, or join his clan in a campaign of honor. When the geisha and her husband rob him of his reinstatement money, Gengobe's guilt drives him to paths of distraction. As the story develops, secrets are revealed but the dark fate that portends is not avoided.
Tonia (Krystyna Janda) is a cabaret singer in post-World War II Poland towards the end of the life of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. After she performs for soldiers, she is arrested without being told why, and placed in a political military prison to be interrogated. Over a course of some years, she is humiliated and tortured by prison officials into confessing to crimes she did not commit. After failing to sign a document detailing a false confession, she is taken to the prison shower block and locked into a small cage between the floors. The water is turned on and the room is slowly flooded. She is released at the last moment and told to sign the confession form again, which she continues to refuse to do. While in prison, she demands that she sees her husband. One day he visits the prison, but is told by the officials of her alleged infidelities prior to her arrest, and he tells her that he doesn't want to see her again. She unsuccessfully attempts suicide. She develops a romantic relationship with an officer, one of the interrogating prison officials, whom she tells of the absurdity of the system he believes in. She becomes pregnant by him and, like other female inmates, is forced to give up her child for adoption, before eventually being released and reunited with her child. The officer secures her release and her ability to reclaim their child and then commits suicide.
Dr. Malcolm Crowe, a child psychologist in Philadelphia, returns home one night with his wife, Anna, after having been honored for his work. Anna tells Malcolm that everything is second to his work, and that she believes he is truly gifted.