Ira Levin’s whip-smart stage play, Deathtrap, was adapted for the big-screen and saw Michael Caine square-off against Christopher Reeve in this captivating cat-and-mouse, twisting thriller.

Micheal Caine is playwright, Sidney Bruhl. He’s just had his latest stage thriller flop on opening night. It’s his latest failure in a string of them. Things are exacerbated, when one of his former seminar students sends him his new play, and it’s outstanding.

Conferring with his wife, Myra (Dyan Cannon), Sidney begins to concoct a plan. Invite the young writer, Clifford Anderson (Reeve) to his East Hampton home, ensure he brings every copy of his play, Deathtrap, and murder him and then shop it as his own creation.

And that’s the set-up, but from there, comes one murderous, provocative twist after another culminating in a thrilling showdown that is absolutely all-out entertainment.

There are countless twists and turns, there’s a psychic (Irene Worth) and a lawyer (Henry Jones), and you can just imagine that the stage show must work as well as the movie does. It’s crisp, funny, smart, thrilling, and keeps you guessing until the very end.

I remember seeing the film’s poster all over when it first came out, and I liked the idea of it because it had a Rubik’s Cube on it. That was something that very much tapped into the zeitgeist of the time, and suggest not only was their a death trap, but also a puzzle that needed sorting.

And it had Superman in it!

Or at least that was the way I thought about it as a kid. I remember my parents rented it, though I can’t remember when, and I remember watching lots of it, and not following it completely, but enjoying it. I think they rented it because so many other people were talking about it, so they must have figured to see what the hassle was about while I rented Star Wars or Raiders of the Lost Ark again.

Now, some forty-years on, it’s lost none of it’s oomph, and is a perfect stage and screen thriller.

Reeve and Caine squaring off against one keeps you watching the screen every moment. And that’s important, cause there are lots of things to catch before the film’s credits roll. It’s just amazingly fun and engaging.

With only a couple of exceptions, all of the action is kept to Bruhl’s home, and it’s a great looking set, I love the fact that the house was built out of a windmill – which in turn suggests lots of turnabouts.

I was delighted to settle in and watch this one, and damn if it isn’t a fantastic piece of work. I’d love to see the stage show!