Claire Ward hires private investigator John March to look into the increasingly bizarre activities of her husband, Charles Dexter Ward / Joseph Curwen, a respected Rhode Island chemical engineer. As their conversations unfold, Claire reveals that Charles has withdrawn from the world, isolating himself in their carriage house, and has become fixated on a disquieting family history. He has recently begun visiting an abandoned ancestral farmhouse near Pawtuxet, where he stumbled upon a portrait of a man who bears a striking resemblance to him. Soon after, Charles purchases the old property and moves in, leaving Claire with more questions than answers.
In the course of his inquiry, John March discovers a steady stream of deliveries to the farmhouse, all of which Charles insists are for routine chemical tests using animal cadavers. The situation takes a grim turn when an elderly neighbor is found dead in his own home, bones scattered and the body seemingly consumed. The police call it an animal attack, but John remains wary, sensing something far darker at work beneath the surface.
Claire and John confront Charles together, only to find him pallid and speaking with an archaic cadence. When pressed for explanations, he speaks of being “on the edge of greatness” and hints that the truth will emerge in six weeks. Worried for his welfare, Claire agrees to have him committed to a hospital. Doctors note an unusually high metabolism and a growing, terrifying hunger that borders on predatory, yet they struggle to rationalize why he now craves blood and raw meat.
Meanwhile, John uncovers a diary in the carriage house written by Ezra Ward, an ancestor dating to 1771. The diary recounts a forbidden affair between Ezra’s line and a woman named Eliza, and reveals that Joseph Curwen had practiced necromancy in hidden catacombs beneath his property. A flood later exposed the catacombs, and the townspeople burned a grotesque creature that dwelled in the river. The entries suggest that Charles’s true biological grandfather may actually be Joseph Curwen, not Ezra Ward, a revelation that reframes everything Claire and John have observed.
To test their theory, John and Lonnie Peck, John’s assistant, escort Claire to the farmhouse to seek the catacombs. They uncover a hidden entrance in the basement leading to a laboratory where half-grown creatures writhe in wells, and Claire discovers a briefcase belonging to Charles. They try to escape, but Lonnie is fatally attacked by one of the creatures. John manages to plant a bomb in the catacombs before the trio flees, bringing Claire to a hospital to recover while doctors confirm that she is pregnant.
Armed with the evidence, John visits Charles in the psychiatric ward and confronts him with the sealed briefcase filled with human bones. He accuses him of being the 250-year-old Joseph Curwen, who found a way to cheat death through necromancy. Charles confesses his identity, admitting that the bones in the suitcase belong to him and that Joseph had killed him after Charles resurrected him. Joseph reveals his plan to restore his health and eventually be discharged so he can impersonate Charles once more. In a violent final confrontation, Joseph attempts to cannibalize John, but the restorative potion from the laboratory is poured over Charles’s bones. The skeletal remains reanimate, tearing away at Joseph, and the two are pulled into a cosmic explosion as their fates collide.
The film closes with the fallout of these revelations: Claire’s medical check reveals she is pregnant, and John and the hospital scene underscored the magnitude of what they’ve uncovered. The eerie lineage, the hidden catacombs, and the deadly necromantic ritual culminate in a spectacular, otherworldly clash between two immortal beings. The boundary between science and superstition blurs as the town’s history erupts into the present, leaving a lingering sense of dread and awe about what mortality can endure—and what it cannot.
