The Window is an unusual film noir in that the main character is a child. Bobby Driscoll plays Tommy Woodry, a nine year old who lives in an old NYC tenement with his parents Mary (Barbara Hale) and Ed (Arthur Kennedy). The film was a box office success much to the surprise of Howard Hughes, who had recently taken over RKO and initially decided not to greenlight the picture's release.
The film's premise is a modern update of "The Boy who cried Wolf," one of the tales from Aesop's Fables. Tommy has a reputation for making up tall tales among his peers as well as the adult neighbors in the building. His parents are at the breaking point in getting him to behave and at one point the father nails Tommy's bedroom door shut so he will remain there for the night.
During one scorching hot night when Tommy decides to sleep outside on the fire escape one story above his bedroom, he witnesses a murder committed by two of his neighbors, The Kellersons (Paul Stewart and Ruth Roman). He tells his parents but of course they don't believe him. Tommy even goes so far as to walk over the local police precinct where he reports the incident and a detective escorts Tommy back to his mother, who promptly informs the officer of Tommy's unfortunate penchant for not telling the truth.
In a bit of a twist, the detective still decides to check on the Kellersons by posing as a building repair estimator and is able to look for clues while the Kellersons remain in their apartment, bent on not arousing any suspicion. After not finding anything, the detective returns to the precinct house and dismisses Tommy's claims as a kid believing that one of his nightmares was true.
The problem with The Window is that we must suspend our disbelief regarding the killers' behavior throughout. Firstly, we never find out why the Kellersons commit the murder. Second, they inexplicably dump the body next door in an abandoned, decaying building. Why they would do that seems not only implausible but a clear plot contrivance. The body could have easily been found and possibly identified and their association with the murdered man could have easily been established.
But even if no association could have been made with the perpetrators, the discovery of a dead body would have suddenly alerted the police that there might have been validity to Tommy's claims. And even his parents might have started believing in what Tommy had been telling them.
Of course the killers dumped the body before they became aware that Tommy might have been a witness. But once they do get an inkling that Tommy might have seen them (and this occurs initially when Mrs. Woodry takes Tommy upstairs to "apologize" to the Kellersons-and later confirmed for sure when Joe Kellerson finds Tommy's note in the kitchen of the Woodry apartment), it is highly unlikely that Joe would have even considered eliminating Tommy, given the fact that the dead body could have turned up anytime and cast suspicion on the couple.
Even without the discovery of the body, little Tommy's demise would have caused a lot of problems for the Kellersons, even if it appeared accidental. So I had trouble for most of the second half, imagining that Joe would actually even consider let alone go through with trying to kill Tommy.
Nonetheless, the final scene in which the Kellersons chase Tommy through the decaying building next door is pretty exciting. Of course Joe gets his just comeuppance by falling to his death when a rotting staircase gives way; and Tommy is saved when the police have him jump into a net, just before the tottering beam he's standing on, gives way.
Driscoll steals the show as the tall-tale teller. Sadly, the child actor turned to drugs as an adult and was found dead in a crumbling building in NYC, not unlike the one depicted in The Window in the climactic scene.
The Window is worth watching but doesn't approach classic noir status due to the implausibility of part of the narrative's basic premise.
The film's premise is a modern update of "The Boy who cried Wolf," one of the tales from Aesop's Fables. Tommy has a reputation for making up tall tales among his peers as well as the adult neighbors in the building. His parents are at the breaking point in getting him to behave and at one point the father nails Tommy's bedroom door shut so he will remain there for the night.
During one scorching hot night when Tommy decides to sleep outside on the fire escape one story above his bedroom, he witnesses a murder committed by two of his neighbors, The Kellersons (Paul Stewart and Ruth Roman). He tells his parents but of course they don't believe him. Tommy even goes so far as to walk over the local police precinct where he reports the incident and a detective escorts Tommy back to his mother, who promptly informs the officer of Tommy's unfortunate penchant for not telling the truth.
In a bit of a twist, the detective still decides to check on the Kellersons by posing as a building repair estimator and is able to look for clues while the Kellersons remain in their apartment, bent on not arousing any suspicion. After not finding anything, the detective returns to the precinct house and dismisses Tommy's claims as a kid believing that one of his nightmares was true.
The problem with The Window is that we must suspend our disbelief regarding the killers' behavior throughout. Firstly, we never find out why the Kellersons commit the murder. Second, they inexplicably dump the body next door in an abandoned, decaying building. Why they would do that seems not only implausible but a clear plot contrivance. The body could have easily been found and possibly identified and their association with the murdered man could have easily been established.
But even if no association could have been made with the perpetrators, the discovery of a dead body would have suddenly alerted the police that there might have been validity to Tommy's claims. And even his parents might have started believing in what Tommy had been telling them.
Of course the killers dumped the body before they became aware that Tommy might have been a witness. But once they do get an inkling that Tommy might have seen them (and this occurs initially when Mrs. Woodry takes Tommy upstairs to "apologize" to the Kellersons-and later confirmed for sure when Joe Kellerson finds Tommy's note in the kitchen of the Woodry apartment), it is highly unlikely that Joe would have even considered eliminating Tommy, given the fact that the dead body could have turned up anytime and cast suspicion on the couple.
Even without the discovery of the body, little Tommy's demise would have caused a lot of problems for the Kellersons, even if it appeared accidental. So I had trouble for most of the second half, imagining that Joe would actually even consider let alone go through with trying to kill Tommy.
Nonetheless, the final scene in which the Kellersons chase Tommy through the decaying building next door is pretty exciting. Of course Joe gets his just comeuppance by falling to his death when a rotting staircase gives way; and Tommy is saved when the police have him jump into a net, just before the tottering beam he's standing on, gives way.
Driscoll steals the show as the tall-tale teller. Sadly, the child actor turned to drugs as an adult and was found dead in a crumbling building in NYC, not unlike the one depicted in The Window in the climactic scene.
The Window is worth watching but doesn't approach classic noir status due to the implausibility of part of the narrative's basic premise.