Overview

Just before sunrise on Easter morning 1912, in a village just outside the New Jersey Pine Barrens, CLARA JANE LAMB, a wealthy, young and outspoken Suffragette, waits at the ancient altar on the mount--the highest point in the town--for the start of the sunrise service. This is the first sermon to be delivered by PARKER EVANS, the young, new minister in town who is in prime consideration for replacing the retiring PASTOR ADAIR. Clara Jane has been smitten with Pastor Park since his recent arrival in town. At the conclusion of the service, word comes of the grisly murder of an expectant young couple on their way to the service. Over the next several months, HARVEY MEDVILLE, the bitter, middle-aged, assistant pastor who has not only been passed over for promotion, but has been repeatedly rejected in his advances by Clara Jane, begins to stalk her in order to gather evidence that neither she nor Parker is morally fit for their town. At the same time, the gruesome killings and a new rash of Jersey Devil sightings mount, resulting in a night of pandemonium just before Halloween. Just after, Parker has an emotional breakdown while giving a sermon, where Medville uses the opportunity to present his accusations that Clara Jane is sinning with Pastor Park. Their reputations ruined and Parker's chances for replacing Pastor Adair dwindling, Clara Jane and Parker keep a low profile for the rest of the year. Clara Jane continues to quietly pursue the growing more despondent, but also becoming more vulnerable Parker. On the morning after the last full moon of December, Clara Jane finds Parker chained up in a room in his basement. After months of growing suspicions, she deduces that during the phase of the full moon, the creature Parker becomes is responsible for the unresolved killings and Jersey Devil sightings. Parker's tragedy endears him even more to her and she professes her intentions to help him with the immense burden he bears. Before New Year's, they secretly marry. Over that winter, the murders and sightings end. Clara Jane keeps Parker well-chained during the nights of the full moon. On Parker's birthday in March, Pastor Adair announces that Parker will officially be replacing him after the Easter sunrise service. Medville, more livid than ever, resumes his stalking. On the eve before Easter, Medville finds Parker chained in his basement just before the rise of the full moon. Thinking that Clara Jane is some sort of sexual dominatrix, before fleeing, he declares his intention to tell the town about them at the sunrise service. Angrier than ever, after his transformation into the beast, Parker breaks free again and wreaks havoc like never before. Clara Jane, now pregnant and armed with a silver-bullet filled pistol, pursues Parker throughout the night, arriving at the altar just before dawn, where Pastors Adair and Medville wait. The beast leaps from the woods and destroys Medville, then, its eyes going to her expectant abdomen, leaps at Clara Jane who has no choice but to unload her pistol into him. As the moon sets and the dying Parker transforms, Clara Jane cradles him and he makes one last plea for her to do something about her pregnancy, if it's a boy, it will continue to unleash his curse onto the world. At a well-equipped, but secret clinic in the city, Clara Jane decides that she must take the chance that their baby is a girl. Half a year later, on the night of the harvest moon in October, Clara Jane is in the throes of childbirth. Just before sunrise, a nurse presents her daughter to her. Another follows--with her son.

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