I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

The joyful confection is coated in a sparkly gloss, bright enough to gleam from the darkest, most cynical corners.

Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

Blistering performances.

Great energy created through well constructed juxtaposition gets this film revved up from the get-go. A car crash is followed by children nearly fist-fighting... then cross-cutting to sharks feeding. Castle uses some good depth of field on the ship creating a sense of transportation (restlessness is a key theme in the film). The staging/blocking is sound creating a sense for the relationships of the characters and their motivation. The direction is attuned for spectator identification and Castle's spooks have heightened effectiveness as a result. The dialogue has an honesty and naturalism reminiscent of Castle's The Americano. Then the titular uncle arrives and good acting all around keeps the film engaging and entertaining. The plot contrivances have to be overlooked simply for the fact that Let's Kill Uncle is a William Castle film! This is one of his better "screwball horror" films which followed his gimmick horror films.

Imaginative lad, orphaned and living on an isolated (some say haunted!) island with his uncle, learns quickly that his bug-eyed relative wants him dispatched permanently in order to cash in on the lad's five-million dollar inheritance. The boy then involves his bickering playmate in turning the tables on the nefarious grown-up, who seems to take delight in this deadly game of cat-and-mouse. Adapted from a novel by Rohan O'Grady, this William Castle thriller is curious and intriguing without being provocative. The kids plot to poison Uncle with mushrooms but are somehow thwarted, while Uncle--armed with a can of gasoline--attempts to set the two on fire (but how would he explain this to the authorities?). You absolutely cannot look for logic in a Castle screamer...but imagine how good (if not great) his films might have been with a little smarts! *1/2 from ****

William Castle was losing touch with his audience around this time and the cheap and efficient producer side of him was clearly winning over the carny style director side of him.The concept of a black comedy geared for kids was a bit novel but Pat Cardi is just too annoying as the little boy and some of the plot devices and effects are real eyeball rollers even for a vintage Castle movie.Nigel Green clearly knows what he's doing and refuses to play down to the material.It may seem like he's going over the top at times but his character is supposed to enjoy outwitting and doing away with the boy that stands in the way of his inheritance.As others have stated the scenes with the shark in the pool are pure hokum guaranteed to illicit peals of laughter as they shift from one scene of a rubbery fin by the diving board to an old and grainy shot of a shark in the ocean.The basic concept of who's killing who? Child or adult? could be remade quite effectively today but this is largely a flop, Stick with The TIngler Or House On Haunted Hill.

Though it starts off somewhat slowly, things instantly pick up when Nigel Green enters the scene. He is a hoot as the coniving uncle, and his various activities (like practicing judo in the house) and dialogue are hilarious (the breakfast conversation with his nephew is the best such scene. I would say the movie gets better as it goes along, getting more twisted with its black comedy. However, the final minute of the movie is a real disappointment. It's as if the screenwriter was running out of time to submit the script to the studio, and wrote in an ending both strange and feeling unfinished. It's still worth a look - if you can find it. It seems that Universal has withdrawn the movie for some reason, and currently the only way to watch the movie is through bootlegs. Perhaps the current owners of the studio are uncomfortable with the whole uncle-trying-to-kill-nephew/nephew-trying-to-kill-uncle thing, even though all this is never presented in a serious manner. Let's hope they eventually find a sense of humor.