THE GLASS CAGE is a brief and snappy murder thriller from those chaps at Hammer Films. It's a bit cheaper than most of their productions but it's nonetheless a solid addition to the sub-genre of murder mystery films with a circus or fairground setting. American import John Ireland plays a carnival proprietor whose latest act is to showcase Eric Pohlmann's starving man, who literally sits in a glass cage and doesn't eat for months while the crowds flock to see him. In a slightly artificial plot, a murderer is at work, bumping off peripheral characters left right and centre, with Ireland at the heart of it. This film is too short and low budget to do little more than join the basic dots, but the excellent cast sees it through nicely. Honor Blackman and Sid James appear early on and never do so again; Sam Kydd gets to do more than his usual cameo; Ferdy Mayne and Bernard Bresslaw are fellow 'exhibits'; Sydney Tafler and Geoffrey Keen a pair of hangers-on. Liam Redmond's drawling Irish detective is the highlight here.
Review of The Glass Tomb
