John Chard

Jul 13, 2014

6.0

Uxoricide! I Saw What You Did is directed by William Castle and written by William P. McGivern. It stars John Ireland, Joan Crawford, Leif Erickson, Andi Garrett, Sara Lane and Sharyl Locke. Music is by Van Alexander (Joseph Gershenson supervising) and cinematography by Joseph F. Biroc. When two teenagers on babysitting duties decide to have fun making prank phone calls, their evening turns sinister when they call up a man who has just murdered his wife… William Castle was of course better known for his gimmicks than for his ability as a film maker, I Saw What You Did shows the best and worst of the great entertainer. Castle produces and directs this one so is accountable for getting the mix completely wrong. At times the picture is genuinely suspenseful, the premise at the core superb, but at others it feels like it wants to be a comedy, further compounded by Alexander’s awful musical score. It’s a score that belongs in something like Bewitched or The Munsters, and quite often takes you out of the thriller zone. Castle unsurprisingly borrows off of some films that influenced his career, but aided by McGivern’s screenplay he manages to put some different spins on the twisty plot developments. It also helps having Biroc (The Killer that Stalked New York/Cry Danger/The Garment Jungle) on photography duty, he’s able to make Castle’s fog scenes appear icy cold, to blend the shadows into the story like foreboding prowlers. Cast wise the elder cast members aren’t stretching themselves here, with Crawford working for food and Ireland on auto-pilot, but the younger actors are great fun and really nail that naivety of youth thing to the max. All told it’s a fun film, if not always for the right reasons. With some Castle invention (eyelet vision?!) and steals – and Biroc on form, there’s more than enough here to compensate for the confusing mix of genres. 6/10