THE WRONG BOX

In the early 19th century, a lawyer tells a group of boys that a tontine has been organised; £1,000 has been invested for each child (£20,000 in total), but only the last survivor will receive all the capital and interest. Sixty-three years later, the last survivors are elderly brothers Masterman and Joseph Finsbury, who live next to each other in Victorian London.

Although Masterman has not talked to his despised brother in years, he sends his medical student grandson Michael Finsbury to summon Joseph to see him. Michael is greeted by Joseph's niece Julia, who says Joseph is in Bournemouth with her cousins. Julia's cousins, Morris and John, receive a telegram from Michael saying that Masterman is dying.

On the train to London, Joseph escapes his grandson minders, entering a compartment and boring the occupant with a diatribe of trivia. Joseph goes to smoke a cigarette, leaving his coat, which the occupant, "the Bournemouth Strangler", dons. The train collides with another train. Finding a mangled body in their uncle's coat, Morris and John assume their uncle is dead. To protect their interest in the tontine, they hide the body in the woods. Morris tells John to post the body in a crate to London. Joseph wanders away from the accident scene.

In London, Michael gets a telegram telling him to expect a statue in a crate. Morris arrives and mistakes the elderly butler, Peacock, for Masterman.

Morris decides to hide the body until Masterman dies, then claim Joseph died of a heart attack upon hearing the news. Morris and John plot to ship the body in a barrel to Joseph's home where Julia lives. Joseph makes his own way to London and visits his brother. Masterman makes several attempts to kill his oblivious brother. They quarrel, and as Joseph leaves the barrel is being delivered to Masterman's house by mistake. Joseph signs for the barrel for "Mr Finsbury". Minutes later, the crate containing the statue is mistakenly delivered to Joseph's house and accepted by Julia.

Morris sees a delivery wagon leaving and assumes his uncle's body has been delivered. He goes to obtain a blank death certificate from Dr. Pratt. Michael helps move the crate into Joseph's house. Julia and Michael kiss for the first time. Michael says they cannot do this as they are cousins; then they discover they were both adopted, thus unrelated by blood.

Michael discovers the body in the barrel and assumes his grandfather killed his brother. When Julia arrives, Michael hides the body in a piano. That night, Michael hires "undertakers" to dump the corpse in the River Thames. When they arrive, Masterman has just fallen down stairs, so they take his unconscious body. Seeing this, Morris assumes Masterman has died.

Morris and John go to claim the tontine with the fake death certificate. The lawyer tells them it is now worth £111,000.

Masterman is returned home by the Salvation Army, who assume he has drowned. Julia orders a fancy coffin for him. Morris orders a cheap coffin to remove the mutilated body, but it is delivered to the wrong house, and Michael sells the piano, unaware the body is still in it. The police become involved when that body is discovered. Masterman sits up as the coffin is being taken away.

The cousins make off with the tontine money in a hearse. Michael and Julia chase Morris and John aboard another hearse. They then encounter a real funeral procession. After a crash, Morris and John realise they have a body instead of the money. The tontine money is about to be buried when they grab it and run off. The box bursts open, and money is blown around the cemetery. Joseph pops up from the open grave just as Masterman arrives. The lawyer arrives to say the tontine has yet to be won. The police detective arrives, and Morris is arrested. They ask who put the body in the piano, as there is a £1000 reward for catching the Bournemouth Strangler. A new argument ensues.

After a series of comic confusions involving mistaken identities, switched deliveries, and bodies concealed in barrels and pianos, the farcical contest for the tontine's fortune is resolved among the Finsbury family.

The ending brings all of the convoluted schemes and misadventures to a head, with the various Finsburys' plots and misunderstandings colliding in true farce form. Ultimately, the film satirizes the absurdity of greed and the lengths people will go for money, making the finale as much about the journey through slapstick chaos as about who actually claims the prize.