Not all oldies are goodies

I went to bed early last night and was watching a really stupid movie on Svengoolie. (Svengoolie is a long-time Chicago television character...a comedic vampire who shows really bad horror and suspense films from the olden days and makes fun of them during breaks.)

This really dumb film starred Joan Crawford and it was one of her worst movies, but it was fun too...especially with Svengoolie's funny interruptions. It was a 1965 black and white film called "I Saw What You Did" about teenagers who are left alone with the one teenager's little sister in a huge house while the parents went out to a dinner party.

For fun, the teenagers decide to make prank calls to people, choosing names from a phone book and they call this house where a guy just killed his wife (in the shower, trying to mimic the stabbing in the shower scene from the Psycho movie...it was really stupid). He doesn't answer the first time, and they forget about him for awhile, but they decide to try again after they are done harrassing a few dozen other people.

Joan Crawford plays Mr Murderer's neighbor and she is madly in love with him and is trying to get him to marry her after he tells her his wife "left" him when in reality he put her body in a trunk, drives it to a wooded area off a busy highway (almost gets caught a few times). When he comes back, Joan Crawford is there and she overhears when the teenager in charge calls him and the way he is talking to her, Joanie thinks it's someone he is having an affair with. The teenager says "I saw what you did and I know who you are" as she had been saying to other people she had been pranking. He starts talking to her, trying to find out what she knows, who she is. She makes up the name "Suzette" and he starts saying her name so Joanie thinks that he has a girlfriend and she gets pissed and nags him after he hangs up the phone and he stabbed his wife for less bitching than the tongue-lashing Joan gives him. But he lets her live, and kisses her and sends her home.

The teenybopper decides she likes the sound of the man's voice so wants to go see what he looks like and she makes her friend and little sister go with her in her mom's car though she only has a permit and drives to this dude's house. (She gets dressed up all prissy for this little adventure, just in case he comes outside. It was so stupid.) They get there and she decides to snoop around and peep in his windows. She sees him, but knocks over a windowsill pot of flowers and he comes to the window, opens it and she gets a really good view of his face, so why not leave then?

Nope...she has to stay. He looks down and sees that someone had to have knocked over the pot since it was a heavier kind and so grabs a knife and goes outside. Instead of running back to her car and leaving, the teenager tries to look in more windows! Then all of a sudden, she is grabbed by the back of the hair and dragged back to her car by screaming Joan Crawford crazy with jealousy. Joan grabs the girl's learner's permit which is for some reason taped to the steering column (maybe that is what they did back in the 50s for student drivers?) and tells the girl to get lost. The girls speed away from the house, in tears.

Joan goes back into the house, flaunting to Mr. Murderer that she now has his "mistress's" name and address. Does she tuck it in her bra and run home? No...she bitches at him...and waves the document around, then throws it on the floor and starts flirting with him. He still has the knife in his hand. BIZARRO! Normal reaction would be to throw stuff and run like the wind. But no...she flirts, makes demands of him marrying her anyway and so...he stabs Joan and she falls slowly to the floor in a dramatic heap.

Then Mr. Murderer does what is expected and picks up the girl's permit, and goes to her house, chases the girls around the house and surrounding foggy woods until the parents come home and save the day.

I think the moral of the story is that Joan Crawford should have retired sooner.