They say that insanity runs in the family, but this is ridiculous. A young guy marries a woman to thwart the attempts of his uncle to control money that was left to him.The uncle is played by a totally sinister looking Errol Flynn. The film takes place in a mansion where the family lives. Geraldine Brooks is a scene stealer as the niece of Flynn who seems care free but is stifled in her attempts to lead her own life by her repressive uncle.The atmosphere is eerie. Even the head maid could be an exact duplicate of Judith Anderson's Mrs. Danvers in 1940's "Rebecca."What was Flynn discussing with the other man? It appeared they were up to no good. How could the Flynn character turn into a good guy protecting his niece and nephew from their supposed inevitable insanity? After all, their father died in an institution for the insane.Richard Basehart literally returns from the dead, as the nephew, near the end of this misery and indeed shows that insanity runs in the family.Jerome Cowan briefly appears at the film's beginning as the brother of Flynn; he is a U.S. senator caught up in politics and goes back to Washington and is not seen again.After Basehart is exposed, Stanwyck, the nephew's widow, walks off hand in hand with her uncle by marriage, Errol Flynn. She weds her uncle by marriage? The whole concept was ludicrous.

"Cry Wolf" came along when Errol Flynn's career was in slight decline. He hadn't had a successful film at the box office for the last few years but the above film is interesting and reasonably intriguing. His character in "Cry Wolf" displays almost nothing of the usual character traits. He is rather austere and emotionally detached. Flynn could quite easily have been cast as a villain. The film is a lot more low key in comparison with other Errol Flynn films. The story mainly revolves around a big house with many acres of land out in the sticks. There aren't the usual lavish production values. The plot doesn't allow for any of the usual camaraderie or any shenanigans that the fans had come to expect from Flynn. The tone of the film is a lot more serious, perhaps a bit grim but still very watchable. As the female lead, Barbara Stanwyck plays a character who attends the reading of a will after learning that her husband has died. Her husband was the nephew of Errol Flynn, who is quick to question if Stanwyck is the genuine article after the family has never heard of her. Whilst her background is being investigated, Stanwyck stays at the family estate where not all is what it seems..... There is a bit of mystery about "Cry Wolf" until about the last 15 minutes when all is explained. The two leads engage upon a series of verbal assaults upon each other and with both giving their all. Worth watching.

. . . and CRY WOLF would be more aptly titled THE KIDS ARE NOT ALRIGHT. All Baby Boomers seem to pass down the story of how one of their President Kennedy's sisters was lobotomized when she started to "go bad" after puberty. That's what wealthy families usually did back in the day. Otherwise, when "bad seeds" were give free reign to mingle with Proper Society, they'd kill rich neighbor girls with golf clubs, and no more family members would get elected to the U.S. Senate. In a story ripped from his tomorrow's headlines, Errol Flynn plays a Kennedy-like fixer in a U.S. Senatorial Family, desperately trying to keep the schizophrenic Mordreds of his clan from running amok in CAMELOT. For a few brief shining moments Flynn's "Mark Caldwell" succeeds in keeping his family nut cases from cracking up. Stuff hits the fan with a mechanic bludgeoned in Canada by a wrench. Though not quite as serious as doing in Mr. Plum by Candlestick in the Library, it's plenty hard enough for Mark to keep America's political mudslingers from getting a CLUE about his NEXT GENERATION Devolving into Common Murderers. But at least Mark's horse gets to take Barbara Stanwyck for a ride here.

Just saw this last night for the first time. Must say that I loved Stanwyck running, leaping, jumping, being thrown by a horse, springing up again only to leap from an eight foot fence to the ground...This was clearly no stunt double. The gal was fleet of foot, and tenacious. She loved playing tough cookies, and that's what she served up here, a tough cookie who was really heroic and unafraid. She, as opposed to Flynn, does all the swashbuckling in this movie, and it's worth seeing just for that reason alone.And it was suspenseful...I was really quite frightened of what she would find in the lab, in the lodge, in the dumb waiter...what's that about the cold cream??? I was so edgy after she scaled the fence into the lodge compound and got lost, that I had to turn off the volume so as not to hear the scary music. So the score really REALLY adds to the suspense.I loved Errol Flynn in his early swashbucklers, and I really liked the character turns he took in Too Much Too Soon, and The Sun Also Rises and That Forsythe Woman. But here, he's just uneven..sometimes even blank, and then other times he's okay. Clearly the writers were trying to create a Max de Winter or Edward Rochester-type character ...is he good, or bad, sincere or lying? But the execution of the idea doesn't gel enough to satisfy.So, the writing's choppy and shallow (especially the last 2 lines of dialogue and resolution), and there's not a TON of chemistry between Flynn and Stanwyck. And yes, the other roles are either over, or under written, so you end up with shadows or stereotypes. But still, I found it fun, and there's no reason why NOT to watch this movie, unless Rebecca or Jane Eyre or Pat & Mike is playing on another channel.