WillSushyMedia
This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.
Sameer Callahan
It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.
Bob
This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.
DKosty123
This 73 minute film is obviously meant by RKO to be the short part of theater double features. Because of this, it is not a big budget film. Yet it has some top talents involved in the cast. Bobby Driscoll, on loan from Disney, is a big name child actor here who witnesses a murder and nobody will believe him. The Cornell Woolrich script based on his story: "The Boy Cried Murder" will later be remade under that title but this RKO version is better. A few years later Woolrich would write an even better script - Rear Window - for Alfred Hitchcock. Besides Driscoll who did Disney's Peter Pan, and Song of the South, Barbara Hale, still in her late 20's plays Mrs. Mary Woodry, who is very involved in the plot. Later she was Della Street, secretary to Perry Mason.The is a lot of Noir flavor to this one as there are a lot of things that come out later in the film. The excitement and thrills of the film hook the viewer very well for the short length (73 minutes) of the film. Worthwhile viewing on all levels.
Charles Herold (cherold)
This zippy little movie is a noir version of The Boy Who Cried Wolf, with a fanciful boy witnessing a murder that no one will believe. The movie is nicely filmed. The camera is generally from little-boy height, with adults towering and powerful. Shadows are used effectively; there's a nice moment where as a murderer goes upstairs the shadow of the banister railing covers her face like prison bars. Bobby Driscoll is effective as the increasingly terrified boy, and Paul Stewart makes a wonderfully malevolent villain. The rest of the cast is solid though not especially memorable.Suspense ramps up nicely, and towards the end the movie is quite exciting. Overall, well worth watching.
secondtake
The Window (1949)A totally classic film noir, fairly low budget, and unique for having a child at the middle of the story. The darkness of the mood and darkness of the filming combine to counterpoint the apparent cheer of this boy in New York City, creating something just short of a masterpiece. Perfect? I wish! But the best of it will blow your noir mind.The whole adventure here happens in an apartment building, one of those brick 5-story walk-ups with fire escapes on the outside. A boy, sleeping on the escape because of the heat, witnesses a murder. He tells his parents, who don't believe him (the movie opens with a summation of the Boy Who Cried Wolf). But of course, the murderer's believe him, and the boy is in danger.You might find this all a contrivance—and I guess it is, in a way, a plot too tight and compact for real life—but it works to create genuine suspense. The characters are all very realistic, from the nice, regular parents who want their kid to start telling the truth to the bad couple upstairs who seem on the surface to be rather like the parents. Even the cops are just regular schmoes. The dark stairway, the window nailed shut, the chases through an abandoned building next door (set up by the opening of the movie with a bunch of kids using it for play), and endless futile persuasion by the boy, who obviously means what he says all add up to for compact, intense ride. And filmed with energy and such dark shadows you can't see a thing. Director Ted Tetzlaff is more known as a cinematographer (including on his last film, "Notorious," which is a masterpiece). As a director this is probably his best film, and he knows how to make the cinematographers under him give him the visual richness the film in its simplicity requires. The plot carries the ideas, for sure, but the visuals carry the mood and intensity, and that's the best of it. And there's not a wasted minute—it's practically a textbook exercise in how to direct with economy, and the benefits of doing so.See it. The title doesn't inspire much—it should be called "Murder in the Window" or something more compelling—but the movie does indeed inspire much. See why. Oh, and a really clean copy is streamable from Warner Archive, which even has a free two week trial.
blanche-2
Barbara Hale, Arthur Kennedy Ruth Roman, Bobby Driscoll and Paul Stewart star in "The Window," a 1949 film.In a takeoff of the story of The Boy Who Cried Wolf, Tommy Woodry is an only child with a very active imagination. He is known among his friends and parents as being a teller of tall tales. One night, it's so hot in their New York apartment that Tommy goes onto the fire escape to sleep. There, looking in the next apartment, he witnesses a murder. The problem is, no one believes him. Except the killers.Good nail-biter with lots of references to corporal punishment for kids, which was common back then. It's plenty of violence, too, as well as a dramatic ending.Arthur Kennedy was one of the most underrated actors in show business - though this is a good film, it's a small one, and he deserved something with a higher profile. Barbara Hale, just a few years later would achieve TV immortality as Della Street, Perry Mason's secretary. At 27, Ruth Roman makes an impression as Mrs. Kellerton, who was involved in the killing. She's both beautiful and frightened.The actor who plays the little boy, Bobby Driscoll was very good and continued to work until around 1960, when drugs and a criminal record kept him from getting work. He died at 31 of heart problems, penniless and homeless.Good movie, worth seeing.
