Review: I Saw What You Did

With her parents (Leif Erickson being the Ward Cleaver-ish dad) out for the night, adorable teen Andi Garrett invites best friend Sarah Lane over for some hijinks. Along with Garrett’s younger sister they start prank calling people at random. One prank involves creepily stating ‘I saw what you did and I know who you are’, and it’s this particular prank that gets them in hot water. You see, the man they’ve just tried to spook (John Ireland) has just murdered his wife in the shower! Still, it’s not like the creepy murderer is gonna come into physical contact with the girls, right?...Right? Joan Crawford plays Ireland’s nosey neighbour who has romantic longings for him.

 

Enjoyable B-movie fun from director/producer William Castle (“The House on Haunted Hill”, “The Tingler”, “Mr. Sardonicus”), this 1965 is a slow-starter but worth the wait. The adorable vintage TV sitcom leads and the jaunty sitcom-ish music score by Van Alexander (“13 Frightened Girls”, “Strait-Jacket”) are pretty damn amusing and the premise is priceless. The whole thing plays like a mixture of “Leave It to Beaver”, “Psycho”, and “Sorry, Wrong Number” and I was fully on board. The prank call session is hilariously irresponsible but totally relatable even though it arrives about 10 minutes too slow by my (impatient) count. Veteran character actor John Ireland is perfectly cast as the killer, and Joan Crawford’s modest melodramatic talents are well-utilised in a rather sad and pathetic role. You don’t know who to feel more afraid for, her or the girls. All three are messing with the wrong guy and are completely in over their heads with him. Meanwhile, for what likely didn’t cost all that much outside of hiring Ireland and Crawford, this looks terrific in B&W thanks to the expert work by Joseph Biroc (“Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte”, “Emperor of the North Pole”). Things start to get less light-hearted in the final 10-15 minutes which are genuinely tense without seeming to come from a different film.

 

A really rock-solid, enjoyable William Castle piece of schlock well worth checking out. The screenplay is by William McGivern (“The Big Heat”, “Odds Against Tomorrow”) from an Ursula Curtiss novel called Out of the Dark.   

 

Rating: B-

 

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