- A writer eloping with his mistress by train has second thoughts, pulls the emergency brake, bails out and witnesses the train's collision with another train, events eventually leading to murder and a police manhunt.
- When John North, a budding author, pulls the communication cord of a late night train that is taking him away on a weekend with his publisher's wife, he sets in motion a series of events that lead to a train crash, a murder, and a police manhunt, but all is not what it seems.—<mike.wilson6@btinternet.com>
- John north and Susan Wilding are both married to other people; tonight they are running away together. They go to Paddington station and are catching an evening train to Plymouth. John is extremely nervous, while Susan is casually cheerful. John has spotted a mysterious man, who he thinks followed them at Susan's house, and he appears at Paddington. John posts a letter to his wife, to tell her he has left her. The train departs, and John is still in a state of jitters. Now there is a flashback to John's home life with Carol. She loves him and worries about him, and he snaps and leaves the house to go to his work in bad humour. Carol has been pressing him to take a better job with her Father's firm, but he insists on trying to make a living as a writer. Now back on the train to Plymouth, John goes in to the corridor approaching a landmark that is close to his home with Susan, and he pulls the communication cord and stops the train. Susan is asleep and doesn't notice the train stopping. John jumps out and makes off for his own home. He goes in and his wife welcomes him. John is obviously relieved at having abandoned his intended departure. While the train he left is stationary, there is a collision, and there is considerable damage. John goes to the train which is close to the house, and sees the body of Susan, evidently killed in the accident. 20 people were killed. Who pulled the communication cord? asks the local newspaper. The next day someone from British Railways investigation branch calls at the house. His name is Clayton. John sees him, looking extremely guilty. Carol sits in on the interview and discloses John's movements that night, to John's discomfort. The man says Susan Wilding was on the train, and was killed, but that she had John's name and address in a pocket book. John's explanation for that doesn't seem convincing, but the man leaves, apparently satisfied. When John leaves the house on a pretext, Carol notices that Susan's name appears in the casualty list in the newspaper, and worse, she discovers the envelope John had posted to her to tell her he was leaving. He had just burnt the letter itself, but overlooked the envelope. John actually goes to the village hall where the bodies of the deceased were laid, but he fails to find Susan; however the railway accident inspector sees him there. John returns home, and sees someone in the dark; Clayton appears and John is aggressive to him. Clayton goes into the house, and reads from the notebook of a private detective who was following John and Susan. It evidently implicates John heavily. Clayton leaves and John makes his hostility evident; Clayton says he is staying at the village pub, if John should want him. When Clayton has gone, Carol makes it obvious she knows what really happened, and John tries to come clean. He admits he was going away with Susan permanently. John says that he also saw Mr Wilding in the train, as well as the detective. John mentions in passing that Mr Wilding is dead. Carol makes it clear that she is going to stay, and suddenly there seems to be a reconciliation. Clayton receives a phone call from John to say that he wants to talk to him, While Clayton is waiting the radio news reports that a signalling failure caused the collision, and that the operation of the communication cord was irrelevant to the accident. Clayton sees John and says that as Mr Wilding was killed in the accident, it might have been him who operated the communication cord, and that he (Clayton) will take no further action. In a dramatic change of mood, Clayton goes to see John the next day; it has emerged that Susan had been shot before the train crashed. In an extraordinary interview, a policeman accuses John of murdering her. John goes home and agonises to Carol, and to his dismay it is obvious she doesn't believe him. A policeman now turns up, and although it is dark, he proceeds to search the garden, on his own. He starts to drain the pond and Carol sees a gun; believing her husband to be a murderer, she tells John, to warn him. He tells Carol to go back down and act naturally. A detective now arrives to arrest John, but his room is locked; they have apparently found the gun now; they break in to his room, and find that he has left a note saying he has run away. The police leave in chagrin, and John reappears from the loft. He now talks about possibly leaving the country, although he is innocent. He is going to hunt for the actual murderer, wherever that may be necessary. He goes to Mr Wilding's house and speaks to Wilding's mother; but she says she knows Wilding is dead: she identified his body herself. John goes to the hotel in Plymouth to which he was travelling with Susan; he tries to check in under the false name he had booked when he was running away with Susan, but someone has already checked in using that false name. John says he is a policeman and goes up to see the man. But first he goes to the adjacent room, apparently empty (although the proprietor has said that the hotel was full). He crawls along a ledge and looks in at the other man's room and sees him. It is not apparent whether he knows him. John tries to phone his wife, but while he is doing so, Mr Wilding bursts in to ask for the loan of a bottle opener. He recognises John and pulls a gun out. Wilding says that he had been on the train with the intention of killing John in Plymouth, but when he jumped, he killed Susan instead. He is drinking heavily and rambles on, telling John the back story. This included putting his identification documents on someone who was already dead in the crash. John lunges at Wilding and inevitably he misses and is felled by a blow. Wilding shoots John in the shoulder and is going to shoot him in the forehead. Just as he is about to do so, the action flashes back to the train. In a changed unfolding of events, Susan has realised John is not committed to a life with her, and she pulls the communication cord. She tells him that the running-away will not work, and he must go back to Carol. John jumps off the train when it stops, and by a fortunate coincidence, it is just at the place opposite his house. He goes in and is greeted by his wife. He looks at the clock and rushes out to the garden, expecting the train crash to be repeated. But the train he left starts away, and there is no mishap.
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By what name was The Interrupted Journey (1949) officially released in India in English?
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