In advance of a presidential visit to the small town of Suddenly, California, a trio of FBI agents enters the Benson family's home to assess potential security risks. Once inside, leader John Baron (Frank Sinatra) reveals himself as a psychopathic assassin, and he kidnaps the family in order to use their house as his vantage point in his plot to kill the president. Sheriff Tod Shaw (Sterling Hayden) matches wits with the assassin and his gang in an attempt to save the day.
In advance of a presidential visit to the small town of Suddenly, California, a trio of FBI agents enters the Benson family's home to assess potential security risks. Once inside, leader John Baron (Frank Sinatra) reveals himself as a psychopathic assassin, and he kidnaps the family in order to use their house as his vantage point in his plot to kill the president. Sheriff Tod Shaw (Sterling Hayden) matches wits with the assassin and his gang in an attempt to save the day.
The dream is unusually vivid: Bank employee Vince Grayson (DeForest Kelley) finds himself murdering a man in a sinister octagonal-shaped room lined with mirrors while a mysterious woman breaks into a safe. It is so vivid, in fact, that Vince suspects it may have really happened. To get the dream off his mind, he goes on a picnic with some relatives. When a thunderstorm forces his party into a nearby mansion, Vince discovers that the bizarre room does exist, and it means nothing but trouble.