Review of Phone Call from a Stranger

I'm at a loss to understand the favorable reviews of this turkey. Gary Merrill (why?), after an overlong prologue, survives a plane crash and decides to call on the families of the three people he got to know during a stopover. The whole thing has a dreary, self-consciously solemn tone as Merrill and the survivors, nearly all of them prim and stiff, exchange homilies. The only point I can see to this movie is that it serves as a series of revenge fantasies. Spouses who misbehave are punished with death, infirmity, and/or humiliation. A nasty mother- in-law is also humiliated (though only a little, and in private--after all, she is a mother, and it is the Fifties). Bette Davis, in her star cameo, is excruciating, using her special, toe-curling wise-woman voice. Aside from one terribly acted and directed comic fantasy scene, this movie is very heavy going.