Strait-Jacket (1964)

Directed by William Castle. Starring Diane Baker, Joan Crawford, Leif Erickson, Howard St. John, George Kennedy, Mitchell Cox, Rochelle Hudson, Edith Atwater, John Anthony Hayes.

Crawford spends twenty years in an asylum after decapitating her husband and his lover with an axe; now that she’s released, and people around her start getting hacked to pieces with an axe, any chance she’s to blame? And any chance that someone else is responsible? Risible but watchable entry in the burgeoning psychobiddy sub-genre gets by on camp hysterics since director Castle is either disinterested or incapable of making any of it sensible or suspenseful. Crawford huffs and vamps with trashy class, but it’s all too obvious what’s happening and who’s responsible (although it does lead to a hysterical shrug of a conclusion to the climax). Stay tuned at the end for an “altered” Columbia Pictures logo. Film debut for Lee Majors in the small role of the cheating hubby in the prologue.

55/100