Plot

Despite her husband's doubts, a woman reaches out to her dead daughter with a psychiatrist's help.

Crista thinks that she has a great life, beautiful daughter Jennie, and perfect new husband George. Then Jennie tragically drowns and everything starts going downhill when she finds out that George was involved in her death.—Harun Mehmedinovic <Pkojovic@concentric.net>

Crista Westfield and her husband George are giving a party to celebrate their one-year wedding anniversary. Jenny, Crista's seven-year-old daughter from her first marriage, is entertaining the guests with a ballet dance. As Crista helps her get ready, Jenny refers to her stepfather by his first name. Crista asks if she won't consider calling him "Daddy" because it would make him very happy. It is obvious that Jenny is not comfortable doing so. Later, when Crista leaves the party to bring Jenny a drink of water, George comes looking for her. He rather impatiently reminds her that she needs to return to the party. Once they are downstairs again, she presents him with his gift, an expensive watch. He has already given Crista her present, a new Mercedes.

Later that night, Jenny awakens thinking she heard her mother crying. She goes to the bedroom of her mother and George, enters without knocking and sees them having sex. Crista reminds Jenny that she is suppose to knock first and takes her back to her own room.

The next day Jenny and Crista are down by the pond near the road. George takes their picture. Crista prepares to go in and start getting ready for a party they are invited to that evening. Jenny begs to row the small inflatable boat around the pond. George agrees to stay and keep an eye on her. Crista returns to the house and dresses for the party. George comes back without Jenny, saying he told her to put her bicycle away. He doesn't like the dress Crista has chosen because it is too revealing. Annoyed, she prepares to change her clothing. Then a distraught voice is heard calling for help. An elderly neighbor has found Jenny's lifeless body floating in the pond.

An unknown time later, on what would have been Jenny's eighth birthday, Crista is visited by Dr. Drake, a family friend. He is there because George is worried about Crista. While she is not interested in following the doctor's advice, Crista does realize that she needs to pull herself together. She agrees to go to the ballet and shopping with her friend Renee the following day. That night George and Crista have sex for the first time since Jenny's death. She asks him what happened to his new watch. Since he kept losing it, he put it away for safekeeping. He presents her with the picture of her and Jenny taken that day at the pond, enlarged and framed.

On the way to the ballet, Crista sees a picture of a little girl on an advertising billboard. It reminds her of Jenny and she wrecks the car. While unconscious, she sees Renee rising from the ground, saying "Don't come. Stay. Don't come." Then she sees a bright light and Jenny is there. Crista then wakes up in a hospital bed. The doctor says she was clinically dead for six minutes. When she tells him and George about seeing Renee and Jenny, they believe she was hallucinating.

Once she is home again, Crista is awakened by a dappled light and Jenny's voice calling her. She wants Crista to tear open the lining of a trunk that belonged to Crista's deceased mother. An antique locket and a handwritten will are discovered. Crista's mother wanted Jenny to have the locket. George thinks Crista is hallucinating again and that she knew all along where the will and locket were hidden. She believes that her mother sent the message through Jenny.

At Renee's house after the funeral, Crista again sees the dappled light and hears Jenny's voice. The child is trying to tell her something but Crista cannot make out the words. George is humiliated that this has occurred in front of their friends. He calls the doctor but Crista refuses treatment. Someone gives her the name of a well-known but unorthodox psychiatrist, Dr. Margaret Neuberger, who believes that the living can communicate with the dead. But before she can call Dr. Neuberger, Crista has another visitation from Jenny. The child wants her to come to the pond. Crista puts her hand through the glass in an effort to unlock the door. George dresses the wound and persuades Crista to go back to bed. She has a vision of George putting a pillow over her head in order to smother her. With increasing hysteria, she orders George to stay away from her. She picks up the phone and asks for the police.

The next scene shows Crista in a hospital room with a Dr. Hamilton, still woozy from the drugs she was given. She has been committed to a psychiatric hospital because she is a danger to herself. Dr. Hamilton believes she may be schizophrenic. He tells her that George has hired a private security guard to make sure she is not disturbed. In other words, George has had her locked up and she might never get out again.

The friend who gave her Dr. Neuberger's name arranges for her to see the doctor at her apartment. Crista escapes from the psychiatric hospital by telling the guard she is going to the sun room. On the elevator she discards her bathrobe, revealing that she is fully dressed. George has no idea where she has gone and threatens to sue the hospital.

Dr. Neuberger hears Crista's story and promises to do what she can to help her, free of charge. She believes that in the six minutes Crista was clinically dead, she was reunited with Jenny. Her soul is still there and that is why Jenny can communicate with her.

The next day, George traces Crista to Dr. Neuberger's apartment and tries to take her home. He becomes sweet and loving, telling her that he only wants to help her and Dr. Neuberger is a quack. But Crista refuses to leave with him and he storms out.

Crista has a visitation and Dr. Neuberger switches on a tape recorder. Jenny seems to be worried that Crista is not at home and she assures the child that Dr. Neuberger is a friend. Then Jenny says that George hurt her. Crista instantly realizes that George murdered Jenny. She is inconsolable, wanting justice for her daughter but knowing there is no proof. Dr. Neuberger suggests that she take a lie detector test, that they are admissible in some courts. Crista does and passes with flying colors.

The next step is a visit to the district attorney. Crista tells her story but he thinks she's crazy. There is simply no concrete evidence that George murdered his stepdaughter. Crista then decides the only way to communicate with Jenny again is in the child's bedroom, where she feels safe. Dr. Neuberger warns her that if George is indeed a murderer he is very dangerous. Returning to the house would not be safe. When Crista insists on doing so, Dr. Neuberger goes with her. George is very angry but allows them to come.

Sleeping in Jenny's room, Crista is awakened by the light and voice. Jenny tells her to find the butterfly in the pond. Dr. Neuberger follows but George gets ahead of her. When Crista plunges into the pond, George goes after her. After a few moments he brings her, unconscious, to the surface. An ambulance and the police are called. While George is talking to the police, Dr. Neuberger hops into the ambulance with Crista and orders the driver to leave. She notices something in Crista's hand. It is a man's watch, with hair caught in the band. When Crista recovers consciousness, she says that Jenny pulled her to the bottom of the pond and put her hand on the watch. It is the one she gave George for their anniversary.

The hair can be identified as Jenny's only by exhumation of the body. Crista is present during the procedure. Before the casket is closed, she places the locket around her daughter's neck, saying that it is hers.

The hair on the watch matches that taken from Jenny's body and George is arrested. But his lawyer discredits Dr. Neuberger on the witness stand and in the end, George is found not guilty. Dr. Neuberger invites Crista to travel to Europe with her. But Crista declines, stating that she has done her best and must now get on with her life. She won't change her name or attempt to hide, despite the fact that everyone probably thinks she is crazy.

George is awakened by a strange light and a child's voice. He goes downstairs but the lights don't come on. He looks outside and sees Jenny far away on the lawn. Angry that someone is playing a trick on him, he grabs a fireplace poker. He smashes the picture of Crista and Jenny, stabbing it with the poker several times. Outside, he hears many laughing, mocking voices. Jenny is shown holding the locket before strangling George with it. When morning comes, George's body is lying on the lawn, an expression of horror on his face.

When the end credits roll, Dr. Neuberger is shown placing the locket around Crista's neck. She turns and smiles into the camera, knowing that at last her daughter's murderer has gotten what he deserved.