Strait-Jacket (1964)

Not only is this film awful, but it's a perfect example of typecasting with Joan Crawford as a woman who is of unsound mind.

A funny, entertaining axe murder romp from director William Castle, who brings all of the expected lurid sensationalism to the film, which is full of the expected spooky music and creaky doors. The opening pictures of people at an asylum are also the same as those used in BEDLAM and ASYLUM, bringing to mind the same distorted, swirling features of the insane.Joan Crawford stars. She shows here that she's still got what it takes to captivate the audience and hold the screen, her acting dominating every moment she appears, and she fits perfectly into the role of the nice but occasionally snarling woman who may or may not be demented. In her black wig she even looks 30 years younger, no mean feat as she was 60 when this film was made, and her character is in total control of things, whether it be flirting with her son's lover or having a screaming match with her doctor.Along with Crawford's considerable presence, there is solid support from the young cast caught up in the nightmare, especially from Diane Baker who seems initially innocent but whose character soon takes another twist. A young George Kennedy appears as an unlucky farmhand who gets decapitated. The film is not particularly violent or gory, and there is no blood in it; however Kennedy's head is cut off in full view of the camera, while other murders are performed in shadow, much like in THE BLACK CAT. The influence of PSYCHO is clear here, with lots of references to 'mother' and schizophrenic activities; to further the point Robert Bloch is on hand as the writer.However, the film spends far too long on talk and not enough action, and therefore may be quite boring for those not experienced with this particular genre. With this fault aside, however, it's a fun story with a bravura performance from Crawford, typical of the director's approach and with a lot to commend it.

The movie was campy, but it was a good choice by William Castle to get Joan Crawford to play the main character. She was seasoned in years by the time she did the film but she still looks good. I notice that Castle did not use any gimmicks in this movie except for her. How much the star has fallen for an Oscar winning actress to do b-grade horror.A step up from his last movie with a similar Hitchcock premise to it, homicidal, Crawford plays a woman who spent 20 years in a loony bin for killing her husband and his lover with an Axe. Attempting to get her life together and bond with the daughter she left behind, Joan's character Lucy finds herself slowly going insane again.The movie is way more develop than homicidal and is given justice by Crawford's acting skills, despite how outdated some of the dialog is. Watching her Axe her husband in the beginning was worth the watch overall.

Written by Robert Bloch (who also wrote Psycho), this story of hateful revenge, mother/daughter madness and psycho axe-murders, was axe-ually quite an effective and compelling little b-movie that proudly lived up to William Castle's reputation for delivering sensational thrills on a less-than-sensational budget.I certainly give all of the actors in Strait-Jacket plenty of credit for their credible character portrayals. There wasn't a single insincere performance in the lot.Besides Joan Crawford's intense role as the tragically mad woman who's now been released from an insane asylum after a 20-year sentence - I give a special nod of recognition to George Kennedy who played Leo Krause, the filthy, callous farm-hand who seemed to enjoy (for the benefit of others) heartlessly slaughtering the farm animals with the aid of his trusty axe.At the time of this film (1964), Joan Crawford was on the Board of Directors at Pepsi-Cola. And because of that this film contains (in one scene) a clear placement of that company's product for all of the viewers to plainly see. (From the absolute bottom of my heart (snarl! snarl!), I "Thank you", Joan Crawford, for being one of the very first to start this truly unwelcome trend that still continues in movies to this very day) As a somewhat comical, twisted, tongue-in-cheek trivia note - The viewer will notice that, at the very end of the picture, when the famous Columbia Pictures' icon (the classic woman holding a torch) appears on screen, she is now shown as being headless, with her noggin noticeably sitting down at her feet.All-in-all - Strait-Jacket's gore may be decidedly laughable when compared to the gruesome standards of today, but as a wacky (or should I say "whacky"?) mother/daughter madness/murder story, it certainly didn't let me down.