Original subtitles

In the superior court of this sovereign state, in and for the county of

Bridgewood, the district attorney of said county hereby accuses Ann Costigan

a felony to wit, murder in the first degree, in that on or about the 18th day

April this year, the county in which this court sits, she did with

premeditation, with malice of forethought, without provocation, and

abandoned and malignant heart, lie in wait for, then strike her husband,

Costigan, repeatedly with a heavy rock, until he was dead.

The defendant pleads that she is not guilty of the offense charged because

was insane at the time she is alleged to have committed the unlawful act.

I am going to commit the defendant, Ann Costigan, to the personal Theodore

Bassett, M .D., for observation at Blair General Hospital.

I will later appoint a second psychiatrist.

I, or a jury, if the defense so wishes, will then study the reports of all

experts, listen to whatever testimony is forthcoming, And the judge asked of the

sanity or insanity of the defendant.

Any motions?

No, sir.

I still would prefer that you plead not guilty.

You're an ugly old man and your mother dresses you funny.

abandon ye who enter here.

Do you know who said that?

No.

They say Dante.

Dante Alighieri.

It's a lovely name.

They say him.

But I don't believe it.

Do you believe it?

We better go inside, Mrs. Costigan.

No man could have said that.

I think it must have been God.

When he threw Lucifer, sweet, gentle Lucifer, down from heaven and created

to put him in.

Damned so.

Oh, yes, please come in, Doctor, and ask these young doctors any questions you

wish.

How long has this man been under treatment?

Eighteen years, in various state institutions.

Diagnosis?

Schizophrenic, catatonic.

Prognosis? Poor.

Supposedly hopeless, doctor?

In my opinion, yes, sir.

Excuse me.

Why is he here?

Chemotherapy, doctor.

Results? Negative.

Electroconvulsive therapy?

Negative.

Insulin? Negative.

You concur with Dr. Ford?

Yes, sir, I do.

What's your name?

Paul Brunner.

Have you been ill?

Yes. Are you better now?

Yes. Would you like to see your wife?

Yes.

Carbon dioxide and oxygen.

It's a magician's trick, a conjurer's trick.

A lousy mixture of carbon dioxide and oxygen.

It won't last more than five minutes and he'll be back inside himself again.

Are you familiar with that trick?

This is not my field, Doctor.

It's a specialist's trick.

It's old hat, 1924.

It's old hat.

And it doesn't do a bit of good.

Won't take.

And it won't hold.

And we can't treat them every half hour, can we?

But it does teach us one thing, doesn't it, young doctors?

It teaches us that insanity is a mask.

An ugly, distorted mask, which I hate.

It teaches us that sanity is still there.

Not dead, not withered, but there.

Waiting to escape.

Waiting to be free. Waiting for us to tear away the mask.

Ted, I want to have a talk with you.

Can you lunch today?

Tomorrow.

Why, Leonard?

The Costigan case.

Some of the members of the board feel that you've been too lenient in your

interpretation of legal sanity.

Some of them think you've been too severe.

I just want to sit down and assure you that, as always, you are to ignore us

all. And call the shots as you see them.

Thank you, Leonard.

I would anyway.

Are you going to tell me about the needles, I mean?

Yeah.

Your spinal tap is an excellent check for infectious diseases.

Our mental condition is often affected by our physical condition.

ask you a few questions?

Turnabout, turnabout, runabout, runabout, their plate, their plate.

What's your name, please?

You like my legs.

How old are you?

14. I saw you looking at them.

How old are you?

28. My name is Anne Costigan.

Are you married?

Yes.

Do you have any children?

Yes, one.

A little girl, seven.

Have you ever been pregnant?

No, she was my husband's. Do you love her?

Yes.

What happened to your husband's first wife?

She died.

How?

It was an accident.

What kind of accident?

What kind of accident?

She was fat.

Did your husband love her? No.

Did you hate her?

Oh, how I hated her.

What kind of accident killed her?

She fell off a cliff and broke her crown.

And all the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put Humpty Dumpty

together again.

How did your husband die?

He's not dead.

Where is he?

At home.

Do you know why you're here?

I really did have to kill him. Why?

So he wouldn't kill me.

He wanted to kill you? Yes.

He attempted to kill you?

Yes, three times.

Why?

He didn't want me.

What, to kill you?

He killed her.

Whom did he kill?

His first wife, of course.

How?

He pushed her.

Why?

He wanted me.

How did you kill him?

Your husband?

My husband is alive.

When can I go to him?

Let me go.

Why didn't you plead not guilty, Walter?

Just want to ride on insanity?

That's dangerous.

Why?

I didn't plead not guilty, Ted, because she's as guilty as sin.

Because I didn't want the facts brought out in open court.

I didn't want a long, sensational trial which would not only have ended in a

verdict of guilty, but which would have aired some very unpleasant and damaging

facts about my client.

That damaging?

Yes, indeed.

Her husband was rich.

Even in these days of punitive taxes, rich enough to have a 30 -acre estate in

Ridgeway Hills.

At one point, it overlooked the valley.

Beautiful view, but dangerous.

Just a... low stone fence, a little below a man's waist, and an almost

perpendicular 125 -foot drop to the rocks and trees below.

She told the police he'd been showing off, walking on the wall, balancing

himself. They almost believed her until the two boy scouts came along.

One of them's almost 17.

He makes a good witness.

They saw her push him over.

Unfortunately, from my point of view, they...

also saw her hit him over the head a half dozen odd times with a big stone

before she pushed him.

But she said that he had tried to kill her.

Yes, she claimed that he tried to kill her on several occasions, that he was

tired of her, wanted to get rid of her, that he had killed his first wife.

Servants, however, relatives, friends, all testified to the fact that her

husband loved her, both passionately and well.

that she was his whole world, she and the little girl, and that it was absurd

contemplate that he would hurt her.

I faced her with this.

She stuck to her story. I couldn't shake her.

I became convinced that she really believed it, that she was insane at the

of the murder, that at the time of committing the act, she was laboring

such a defective reason from disease of the mind so as not to know the nature

and quality of the act she was doing.

Or if she did know it, that she did not know that what she was doing was wrong.

I'm acquainted with the MacNaughton rules, Counselor.

She's too pretty to die, Ted.

Brandy, no coffee.

The same here.

How long has it been since college, Ted?

Twenty... some years.

Whatever took you out of law into medicine?

I don't know.

Whatever took me out of internal medicine to psychiatry, the Lord only

And what took me into forensic psychiatry, the devil only knows.

Nurse, are you all right? Are you

all

right, nurse?

I think so. Go to the nurse's room and lie down.

Come on, Kildare.

Sit down on your bed. This is not my bed. Nothing in this room is mine. Sit

down.

Why did you attack the nurse?

She hit me.

Why did you attack the nurse?

My husband wants to marry her.

Is your husband still alive?

Yeah. Do you love him?

Love?

I love New York in spring.

How about you?

Moon, June, Spoon, my husband is 20 years older than I am, Doctor.

Is that why you killed him?

My husband says this excites him.

Oh, that excites you?

Do you think I'm beautiful?

Yes, I do.

Now, if you attack the nurse again or anyone else, I'll put you under

It's uncomfortable and very unpleasant.

Do you understand me?

My hair.

I'd like to cut it.

He never let me cut it.

A monstrous bug.

With a little butterfly flying in front of it.

And mashed butterflies on the wall behind it.

Bleeding.

You're going to touch her neck.

He?

Connie Ponyfingers.

But look at his eyes.

They're looking sideways.

He's looking at someone else.

He's going to throw her away.

How is he going to throw her away?

They're determined.

She won't let him do that to her.

They're hard and determined.

She won't let him do that to her.

Do what?

Throw her away?

Yes.

How would he do that?

Kill her.

Are they married?

Couldn't he divorce her?

No.

Why not?

Because he'd have to give her half of everything, and he didn't want to do

Well, gentlemen?

Do you have enough?

Give me until tomorrow.

All right.

Bye, Doctor.

Bye. Bye, gentlemen.

Is she going to examine her again?

Mrs. Anderson is an excellent psychologist.

She just wants more time to think, that's all.

It was interesting.

I'm glad you invited me over.

Since Emma died, my courtroom's been my life, and it gets stodgy sometimes.

Can you really tell anything from those things?

Now, insanity is not just the way a person thinks or doesn't think or how he

acts or doesn't act.

It is literally the way the five senses deliver the messages to his brain.

We show him abstract designs and ink blots, blots which might make a placid

person think of a rippling river.

An engineer might see a complex dynamo.

The paranoiac with delusions of persecution, he might see the face of

who wants to murder him.

Correlate the test to a dozen other similar subjective tests.

Well, it helps.

Can it be faked?

You mean, can we be fooled?

Yes.

Judge, do you ever make judicial errors?

Never.

In that event, I want you to read me some law apropos of the Costigan case.

You know the law, Ted.

I want an expert opinion.

If she was legally sane at the time of the murder, I'll sentence her to life

imprisonment or death, depending upon whether or not there are mitigating

circumstances.

If she was legally insane at the time of the murder...

I'll commit her to a state institution for the criminally insane for life.

At such time as she has recovered her sanity.

At which time she'll be released.

Free and clear.

That's right.

There's a bird in the blue sky and all the hawks in the world dead.

If upon my recommendation, the court finds that she was insane at the time of

the murder.

But if, in fact, she's hoodwinked us, tricked us by some very clever play

acting, if she was sane, then we are convinced that she was insane.

In that event, Doctor, she would be committed to the aforementioned state

institution for the insane, quietly recover in, say, a year's time, perhaps

three months, that's the minimum, and be let out as free as the aforementioned

bird, even if we were then convinced of her fraud.

Even if we could prove it, it could prove a cold -blooded, deliberate

She could not be tried again.

That's my expert opinion.

You know it, Ted.

Why ask me?

She murdered the first wife.

Get back on base, son.

She worked for the first wife.

She was governess for the little girl.

That's right.

Did she murder the first wife?

I have no opinion.

You're asking for my opinion, Judge.

It's a woman's life.

Just your opinion, Ted.

I make the judgment.

I'll trade you jobs.

Did she murder the first wife?

The district attorney thinks so.

I think so.

I'm worried about the little girl.

How so?

Mrs. Costigan was born poor.

She married poor.

She's now a rich woman.

If, uh...

And I only say if she murdered the first wife for profit and the husband for

profit, why not the child?

According to the terms of the will, if the girl dies before she reaches the

birthday, Mrs.

Costigan's already considerable estate will double.

I'm worried.

I note that I don't surprise you.

I thought of that.

Be on the safe side, I want a court order.

To use sodium theopentol.

A truth drug?

And hypnosis.

You think you'll get to the truth that way?

I've got to try.

Beautiful woman, Ted.

Oh, it was bad.

These are my trees.

Fine.

I recognize them.

I know where you're taking me now.

Do you want to know?

Sure. Where are we taking you?

Home.

I wonder why.

Yeah.

He took a long fall.

And all the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put Humpty together

again.

That's a nursery rhyme.

Yes, sir.

I've got an extra overcoat at home.

Want it?

Yes, sir. Thank you.

I've had it two years, but it's still very good. Oh, unlike he who was poor

proud, interns are both poor and unproud, Dr. Bassett.

I remember, son.

Is the beer pent already?

Yes, sir, it is.

Question, doctor.

All right.

Why give it here?

Instinct.

Why do you object to the use of sodium...

The Opental doctor.

Because we're supposed to be doctors, not policemen.

We're supposed to cure, not condemn.

We're supposed to help sick human beings, not torture them.

If they're sick.

If they're sick.

Not if they're faking.

That is what we have to determine.

There's no ethical issue here.

Mrs. Costigan.

is confessed murderous.

Are you warm enough, Ann?

Yes.

I'm going to give you an injection, Ann.

It won't hurt you.

There we are.

Why did you bring me here?

Look around you, Ann.

It's a lovely house.

Do you know what a shanty is, sweet Dr.

Bassett? A nice, old -fashioned, coal -town shanty.

I am.

Count backward from 100.

Start at 100.

100.

99.

98.

97.

97.

97.

All right, Anne.

Can you hear me?

Yes.

Did you murder your husband, Anne?

Did you murder your husband?

Did you kill your husband, Anne?

Yes. Did you murder him?

Yes.

Why, Anne?

Open your eyes.

Why?

Was it the money?

Why, Anne?

Why?

Why?

Why? No!

No!

Let me go!

This is that last report, sir.

Well, it's time to get off the fence.

I'm ready for evaluations.

Lucy?

I hate to jump off the fence.

It's time.

It's my opinion that Mrs. Costigan has a functional psychosis.

My best guess would be schizophrenia with paranoid delusions of persecution.

It's my opinion that she was suffering from the psychosis at the time of the

murder.

I've had off and on feelings that she was faking.

That her reactions to the very subjective test that I gave her were too

classical.

I'm still troubled with these feelings.

But if I have to, I say functional insanity as I've outlined it.

Is that your opinion, Dr. Kildare?

Yes, sir. And you, Dr. Ford?

I think so.

And you, doctor?

I don't want to get off the fence.

It's time.

It is.

Lucy, gentlemen, thank you.

He does know, doesn't he, Doctor?

Know what?

What he thinks.

Lucy?

Right from the very beginning, I would say.

But not here.

Here.

Right, Doctor?

Thank you for the room and my things.

Why?

Save for the little girl.

And not for me.

No, I think for you, too.

They say the patient always falls in love with the psychiatrist.

Is that true?

Sometimes.

And does the psychiatrist sometimes fall in love with the patient, too?

No.

I don't think that's true.

Perhaps not.

Are you in love with me?

I'm not your psychiatrist.

I represent the state.

But you don't love the state.

No.

And you do love me.

Maybe.

A little.

I don't love you.

I know that.

Do you love anyone, Anne?

I love children.

And puppies and kittens and furry little things.

If they're cute.

Do you love anyone, Anne?

I don't know.

Have you ever loved anyone?

Sometimes I don't think I love myself.

I'm getting better, aren't I?

Have you been ill?

Yeah.

Why did you kill your husband?

He was fat and he was dirty and he made me dance the hurdy -gurdy.

Come back to me, Ann.

I'm sorry.

Sometimes I go away.

Where?

Inside myself.

Please don't make me see her now.

Why not?

Because she's the only thing in this stinking world that I really love. And I

say strange things, and I do strange things, and I don't want that to happen

front of her.

I'll go away. I'll hide.

I'll go inside myself.

Lady, how are you?

Oh, you look wonderful.

What's all right, Doctor?

Are your legs tired?

No, sir.

Will you open the shades for me, please? Okay.

Could you tell anything from a reaction to the little girl?

Was that why I brought them together?

I thought so. I was really interested in the little girl's reaction to the

woman.

Doctor, are you at all familiar with the use of post -hypnotic suggestion in the

practice of psychiatry?

No, sir, not really.

Not even a page and a half's worth from some now -outdated textbook on abnormal

psychology that you read in medical school?

Not much, yes, sir.

But if we can induce deep hypnosis in a patient, we can make a suggestion that

he will and must carry out in the future after the hypnotic state is terminated.

Now, this suggestion is extremely powerful.

In most cases, it's compulsive.

There are two drawbacks, however.

It's not of long duration, and we can only treat the symptoms.

Most expert opinion believes that under post -hypnotic suggestion, you can't

make a person...

or do anything that ordinarily he would find immoral or wrong or harmful to

himself, which in any way raises any real anxiety in him.

To be brief, the belief is that if I could hypnotize you under post -hypnotic

suggestion, I could make you, oh, bark like a dog, stand on your head.

But I couldn't make you take up a gun and shoot yourself or shoot me.

Is that your opinion, Doctor?

No, but I'm in the minority.

I believe that there are ways to circumscribe the anxiety -provoking

Do you, Doctor?

No opinion.

Oh, come off it.

Well, I... I don't believe that a person who's hypnotized can be made to perform

a post -hypnotic act that he didn't want to do.

Any kind of act at all.

Oh. Yes, sir.

Let's find out.

What, me?

Yeah. Do you have any objections?

No.

All right.

Let's try it.

Okay.

Sleep, Doctor.

Sleep.

Open your eyes.

Stretch out your right arm.

Stretch it out.

It's stiff.

It's rigid.

When I tell you, you'll try to bend your arm.

You'll try with all your strength, with all your might, but you'll be unable to.

Bend your arm, Doctor.

Relax your arm, Doctor.

You can stop trying.

In a few moments, I'm going to wake you up.

Shortly after that, I'll snap my fingers.

When I do, you'll go to my desk.

You'll pick up my decanter and pour the water out of it into a glass which is

there.

And you will drink.

You'll have a terrible thirst.

An obsessive thirst.

You'll say to me, I'm thirsty, Doctor.

I must have eaten fish today.

You'll be unhappy, uncomfortable, distraught.

You'll have a terrible thirst.

Now, no other water, nothing, will be able to quench that terrible thirst

the water from my decanter on my desk.

I'm going to wake you up now, Doctor, and I clap my hands. You'll awake.

You'll be happy, refreshed, and content.

Great doctrine.

Open your eyes, then.

Now, Ann, I'm not going to ask any more questions, but I'm going to say some

things to you, and they're true.

And because of that, you believe them.

I'm going to explain to you what will happen to you if you were sane when you

murdered your husband.

And I'm going to explain to you what will happen if I find that you were

If you were sane...

I don't think the judge will take your life.

You're too pretty for that, and the judge personally doesn't believe in

punishment.

He'll give you life imprisonment, which means in this state that probably in

five years you'll be free.

You'll still be a young woman.

Now, if I find that you're insane, you'll be committed to a state

for life, or until such time as you recover your sanity.

But you will never recover your sanity, Anne.

We will be suspicious that you fooled us.

Because of that, we'll be suspicious of any recovery that you might affect.

We will find reasons to keep you in that institution.

You'll be a very old woman when you're free.

I want you to think of these things, Anne.

They're true.

And I want you to believe that.

In a few moments, Ann, I'm going to clap my hands together and you'll awake.

Now, on the bureau in your room, in front of the mirror, there'll be a pair

blunted shears.

The nurse will leave you alone.

If you killed your husband in cold blood, deliberately, if you've been

to us, when you hear the bolt thrown on the door locking you in,

You'll go to the bureau, look at the shears, look at your hair in the mirror,

and you'll cut it.

You'll cut it short in the French or Italian fashion.

When you've done that, you'll call the nurse and ask to be returned here to me.

When you go back, you'll touch your hair and you'll say to me, it is pretty,

though, isn't it, Doctor?

All right, Anne, wake up.

Is it done?

Yes.

When I see you again.

One more time.

Was all that about the judge not believing in capital punishment and her

spending the rest of her life in a mental institution was... Was all that

Doctor?

No.

It was necessary to balance the anxiety -provoking factor.

Otherwise, all this would have been useless.

Doesn't give her much of a chance, does it?

Not if she's faking.

Doctor, I'm thirsty.

I'm just eating fish today.

Was this a post -hypnotic suggestion, Doctor?

Yes, sir.

No, sir.

Yes, sir.

Congratulations.

You know, you just saved yourself $19 .75.

I wish I could add that I displayed such admirable restraint when I was your age

and the same trick was played on me by a friendly chief of psychiatry.

I held out till 11 o 'clock.

By that time, his office was locked.

It cost me $22 to fix that door.

Has she been here?

No.

Not yet, you mean?

I think so.

Is she going through what I went through?

I think so.

Can I say?

Of course.

Here's my finished report, if you'd like to read it.

But, Mrs. Costigan, when?

By morning, I'd say.

Is that long?

Women, Doctor, carry children for nine months.

Let me bear them.

They have a great capacity for both patients and for pain.

Good morning, Doctor.

Any word yet?

No. I don't think she's going to come.

Have some coffee.

Is that a hospital?

No.

Frank, you're not in.

It is pretty, though, isn't it, Doctor?

Yes, it is.

Mrs. Costigan, I'm going to report to the court that,

in my opinion, you were sane when you murdered your husband.

It's my report.

It's already written. I don't intend to add anything to it.

But I would like to ask you three questions.

Why did you murder your husband's first wife?

Because she was fat.

I could say because I wanted to marry her husband, but I won't.

Why did you murder your husband?

Because he was old and ugly.

I could say because I wanted his money, but I won't.

Did you intend to murder the child?

I used to have to change her diapers.

How I hated that.

I need a drink.

I thought you were wrong, Ted.

I really thought you were wrong.

What hell a psychopath must go through.

Yes, she's a psychopath.

But that's a word the law neither recognizes nor understands.

She's legally sane.

I still need that drink.

I'll have a rain check.

You buying, Doctor?

Yes, I am.

Let me get my new coat.

Thank you.