The Forms of Things Unknown

The story begins in the French countryside, where a car can be seen driving at high speed. The driver, Andre Pavan a wealthy playboy, is kissing his girlfriend Kassia Paine while Kassia's friend Leonora Edmond sits in the back seat.

Andre decides to stop at a small lake for a swim, stripping down to his swim trunks. He orders the women to make him a drink, and they do so – but lace the cocktail shaker with a leaf from the deadly Thanatos plant. Andre, with jovial cruelty, makes the women serve his drink while he stands in the water, ruining their "fine stilletto heels" as he puts it. He drinks a toast to blackmailing Leonora's father in London, and dies immediately, but with a strange smile on his face.

The women load Andre's corpse and clothing into the trunk of the car and drive in search of a place to bury it. Leonora is unnerved by the whole thing, and becomes more nervous after they encounter a funeral procession. When night falls and a thunderstorm starts, Leonora's nerves are on edge. Kassia tries to calm her, but then the trunk comes open. They stop the car to check on Andre, who hasn't moved. But a lightning flash makes it seem to Leonora as though he had blinked, and she runs off, frightened. Kassia catches up to her and tries again to calm her, but both women see a shadowy figure standing nearby. This is too much for Leonora, who runs to a nearby house. A blind man, Monsieur Colas, answers the door and lets the women in from the storm. Colas explains that "Mr. Hobart" is not at home, but will return soon.

The house is spacious but oddly decorated: the most prominent features are a broken clock with a clown face, and a toy tightrope walker. Leonora seems particularly drawn to the tightrope walker. At last, Tone Hobart, an odd inventor, comes home. He apologizes to the women, explaining it was he they saw outside. He goes upstairs to his room, asking not to be disturbed as he works on his invention. As he opens the door, Andre's corpse can be seen placed on a strange device. Kassia decides to check on the car – and Andre, leaving Leonora alone.

Leonora looks on in mesmerized fascination at the tightrope walker. Hobart enters the room and asks her about what happened to Andre. Leonora answers truthfully, seemingly under hypnosis. When Hobart "snaps her out of it", he invites her upstairs to see Andre live again and be free of her guilt over the murder. He explains he'd created a device that can "tilt" the past into the present and resurrect the dead, including himself. Reluctantly, Leonora agrees to see the device. They come to Hobart's room – which is dominated by the time tilter, a large collection of clocks all connected by wires to a pole in the center of the room. The loud ticking is too much for Leonora, who runs back downstairs and faints. Hobart is more interested in the fact that Andre is not there.

When Leonora awakens, Kassia has returned. Hobart has gone outside to look for Andre – and takes a moment to look through the window from outside, unnervingly. Colas explains, with some indignation, that he is not Hobart's servant, as the women had supposed, but the house's owner, and Hobart is his boarder. Colas explains further that Hobart had apparently died, and when his body was placed on the time tilter, he came back to life.

The women decide to leave but get no further than the front door when they see the car has backed up to the entrance, the trunk opens and a fully clothed Andre pops out, smiling and holding his empty cocktail glass. He cheerfully asks, "Refill?" This is too much for Leonora, who runs upstairs into what seems to be an empty room. Colas goes outside to find Hobart, and finds him lying in the road between a set of tire tracks, but unhurt. Hobart now realizes that he has unleashed a monster and comes back to the house to correct that mistake.

Surprisingly, Kassia and Andre are kissing passionately. Andre takes a moment to ask how he died, and when Kassia tells him they used a leaf from the Thanatos plant. Andre is still intent on blackmail. Kassia tries to dissuade him as Andre is already rich. Andre replies, "I'm loud rich. I want to be quiet rich." Kassia says one has to be born to that and comments on Andre's motivations. Andre cheerfully replies, "You've pierced the heart of my psychic disorder," but remains intent on carrying out his plot.

Hobart loads a pistol, intending to force Andre to return to the time tilter. Andre is more amused by this than anything else, especially when Hobart becomes enthralled by the tightrope walker toy, allowing Andre to disarm him. Andre fires a shot into the easy chair, inches from Hobart's head. He tosses the pistol aside, singing "London Bridge is falling down" and drives off with Kassia. They do not get far, though. Kassia leaps out of the car and Andre stops, backs up, and then tries to run over Kassia as she lies in the road. Kassia is able to leap out of the way and the car crashes, killing Andre again, with an odd smile on his face.

Hobart realizes he has failed and goes upstairs, seeing Leonora near an open briefcase. Inside is a letter that Hobart wrote when he was a boy, which Hobart reads to Leonora from memory, apologizing to his father for leaving school to find a way to bring dead people (initially his mother) back to life. (There is an inconsistency here, as the camera clearly shows the words on the letter saying that Hobart actually apologized to his father for "killing the cat".) Hobart asks Leonora to destroy the time tilter after he has used it to return himself to the past, where he is dead. Leonora panics, runs into the time tilter room and closes the door behind her. Hobart is able to open the door and push Leonora away from the device. He steps into it and disappears.