THE CONSTANT GARDENER

Revealed in a flashback: The company "Three Bees" develops a tuberculosis drug

"Dypraxa" and has drug trials conducted in Kenya by "KVH" (Karel Vita Hudson). In
order to get willing test subjects, KVH offers treatment for HIV at no cost.
KVH discovers that the "Dypraxa" drug is effective, but kills a higher number of people
than would be acceptable. Three Bees, to prevent delaying the release of the drug and
spending millions of dollars on refining the formula, covers up the deaths with the
assistance of the British Foreign Office.
The inventor of Dypraxa, Dr. Lorbeer, upon discovering his trial has killed so many
people, runs away and attempts to atone for the deaths by treating villagers in Southern
Sudan.
Tessa Quayle, a rich Amnesty International activist, lives in Kenya watching for
corruption and waste of foreign aid sent for medicine and hospitals, and becomes aware
of the unnecessary tuberculosis treatment while visiting HIV patients with a Kenyan
doctor, Dr. Arnold Bluhm. Arnold is gay but keeps it a secret since homosexuality is
illegal in Kenya. Tessa and Arnold are close, which causes rumors of an affair because
Tessa is married to Justin Quayle, a low-level British diplomat and horticultural hobbyist
posted in Kenya.
Tessa, who is very pregnant, sees a new mother get very ill who was part of the trial.
Tessa and Arnold try to get some attention on the trial by writing up a report for
the Foreign Office, but to protect Justin, Tessa takes the report to her husband's
coworker, the British High Commissioner, Sandy Woodrow. Sandy sends the report to
his boss in London, Sir Bernard Pellegrin, who heads the Africa Desk at the Foreign
Office.
Sir Bernard Pellegrin, immediately writes an incriminating letter to Sandy saying that by
acknowledging that there could be a risk of Dypraxa causing unnecessary deaths,
the Foreign Office cannot claim ignorance when Three Bees announces the safety of
Dypraxa, so the report must be buried, and Tessa and Arnold need to be kept under
surveillance to further block any reporting of problems with Dypraxa.
Sandy realizes he made a mistake to send the report but doesn't recognize the danger
Tessa is in. When Tessa asks Sandy about the response he deflects that he only got a
personal letter in response. Tessa promises she will have sex with him if he shows her
the letter. Sandy hands her the letter and tells her to leave it in his drawer after she's
read it.
Tessa reads it and realizes the situation is serious. Determined to not have the lives of
poor Kenyans sacrificed so Three Bees can make millions of dollars, she arranges for
her and Arnold to go find Dr. Lorbeer in southern Sudan so she can get proof of her
theories and turn those in to a German watchdog group.
Knowing she is in danger, she ensures her will is set to take care of her husband,
including leaving him the home in London so that he can go home to it after she passes
away. Sandy, still holding out hope that Tess will leave Justin for him, writes her a letter
asking for them to run away together. Tess hides this letter in a keepsake box.
Tessa and Arnold go to southern Sudan and find Dr. Lorbeer, get the clinical trial data
from him and record him on tape admitting to what he knows about the drug trials killing
people, and leave the letter that Pellegrin wrote with him as proof that the  Foreign
Service was also aware of the issue. Sandy informs Pellegrin that Tess and Arnold are
on the move, and Pellegrin orders a hit to be placed on them, and for it to look like
Arnold raped Tessa and beat her to death.
Tessa and Arnold hire a driver to leave in order to mail the evidence and tape, only to
be run off the road by the hit squad, where the driver is killed, Tess is raped and beaten
to death, and Arnold is abducted, has his tongue cut out, crucified upside down, his
penis cut off, then shoved into his mouth.
Sandy gets the news, goes to Justin, and tells him they are getting reports of a white
woman and black driver found killed in the southern end of Lake Turkana. Sandy says
Tess and Arnold spent the night at Lodwar, shared a room, then hired a car, and
Arnold's whereabouts are unknown.
The movie flashes back to Justin and Tess meeting and falling in love. In the present,
Justin and Sandy are taken to a Kenyan morgue to Tessa's body. Sandy now
understands that a hit was put out on her because of the report she filed and Justin
identifies her body.
Tessa's office has all the computers and CD's taken from it in an effort to wipe out any
evidence of the crime, but Justin finds Sandy's letter in the keepsake box, where Sandy
asks for "the thing you took from me" (the letter from Pellegrin). Justin becomes
determined to get to the bottom of her murder and notices people tailing him,
intimidating him with notes, and eventually beating him up and telling him to stay away.
Despite this, he continues to uncover his wife's final days. Three Bees in the meantime
have made the announcement of a safe Dypraxa and their stock price has soared.
While in London, Justin meets with his lawyer who is Tessa's first cousin, Ham. Ham
lets him know that she took care of Justin in the will in case she died, as little as a week
before she was murdered.
Ham helps Justin get a fake passport, since they know they are both being watched,
then set up Tessa's aunt in Rome as a contact that Justin can call to get ahold of Ham.
When Justin finds out about Dr. Lobeer in southern Sudan, he visits him and gets the
incriminating letter, which he has mailed to the aunt in Rome. He then goes to Lake
Turkana, where he says that he knows all of Tessa's secrets, that he understands her
now, and he is coming home. To prevent being tortured to death, he removes the
bullets from a gun and likely brandishes it to the approaching hit squad so that they kill
him.
At Tessa and Justin's London memorial service, Pellegrin speaks of Justin as having
committed suicide in the same place where his wife died because he didn't want to
bother anyone else with his death. Ham starts speaking as if reading a bible verse but
instead reads the incriminating letter written by Pellegrin to Sandy. When Pellegrin
realizes what's been done in front of a church full of witnesses and reporters, he storms
out of the church and into a waiting car.