You remember when you saw Joan Crawford go off the rails on her daughter in “Mommy Dearest”? Well in Crackle.Com’s Summer Drive-In flick “Strait Jacket” she is truly certifiable.

Joan plays Lucy Harbin, a woman who has just been released from a mental institution for the double murder of her husband and his mistress. She tries to reconnect with her daughter Carol (who witnessed the events) who is now a young woman about to get married herself. Most of the beginning of this movie is told in flashbacks by Carol as she is explaining her past to her fiance. The director of this film was William Castle, who also brought us the original version of the horror flick “13 Ghosts” and the Vincent Price movie “The House on Haunted Hill”. So while he is no slouch at horror I really had a hard time connecting with this movie. Aside from a couple of murder scenes and some suspense here and there, the movie really doesn’t hold up to today’s expectation of what a horror movie actually is. As far as the poster for this movie is concerned, which warns of “vivedly depicted ax murders”…I just say “Meh”. One cool piece of trivia about this film is it is the theatrical debut of Lee Majors (at the recommendation of his good friend Rock Hudson).

A piece of information regarding the production of this movie was that Joan Crawford was notoriously hard to deal with. She required script and cast approval, she hired actors for parts without the knowledge of the director, and even replaced the lead actress who played her daughter shorly after filming began.