The Window (1949 film)

Last updated
The Window
The window 1949.jpg
Theatrical release poster
Directed by Ted Tetzlaff
Fred Fleck (assistant)
Screenplay by Mel Dinelli
Based on"The Boy Cried Murder"
1947 story in Mystery Book Magazine
by Cornell Woolrich
Produced byFrederic Ullman Jr.
in charge of productions
Dore Schary
Starring Barbara Hale
Bobby Driscoll
Arthur Kennedy
Paul Stewart
Ruth Roman
Cinematography Robert De Grasse
William O. Steiner
Edited by Frederic Knudtson
Music by Roy Webb
Production
company
Distributed byRKO Radio Pictures
Release dates
  • May 17, 1949 (1949-05-17)(Premiere-Los Angeles) [1]
  • August 6, 1949 (1949-08-06)(U.S.) [1]
Running time
73 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$210,000 [2] or $500,000 [3]

The Window is a 1949 American black-and-white film noir, based on the short story "The Boy Cried Murder" (reprinted as "Fire Escape") [4] by Cornell Woolrich, about a lying boy who witnesses a killing but is not believed. The film, a critical success that was shot on location in New York City, was produced by Frederic Ullman Jr. for $210,000 but earned much more, making it a box-office hit for RKO Pictures. The film was directed by Ted Tetzlaff, who worked as a cinematographer on over 100 films, including another successful suspense film, Alfred Hitchcock's Notorious (1946). For his performances in this film and in So Dear to My Heart , Bobby Driscoll was presented with a miniature Oscar statuette as the outstanding juvenile actor of 1949 at the 1950 Academy Awards ceremony.

Contents

Plot

In New York's Lower East Side, lives young Tommy Woodry, who has a habit of crying wolf. Late one night, while trying to sleep on the building fire escape, he sees his two seemingly normal neighbors, Mr. and Mrs. Kellerson, murder a drunken sailor in their apartment. No one – neither the boy's parents nor the police – believes Tommy when he tells them what he has seen, since they all assume that this is just another of the boy's tall tales.

When Mrs. Woodry takes Tommy to apologize to the Kellersons, he refuses, and they become suspicious of him. When Mrs. Woodry leaves to care for a sick relative, and Mr. Woodry is away at his night job, the murderous neighbors plan to kill Tommy, who has been locked in his room by his father to prevent other escapades. Under the pretense of going to the police, the Kellersons take Tommy to a dark alley, where they try to kill him. Tommy escapes, but the pair quickly recaptures him, taking him to their apartment in a taxi. Tommy screams at a policeman for help, but the officer remembers Tommy as the boy who came to the station earlier and failed to convince the police. The Kellersons fool the cab driver by posing as Tommy's parents. Returning home from work early, Mr. Woodry discovers Tommy missing and asks a neighborhood police officer for help. The officer uses a police box to request a radio car.

Meanwhile, the Kellersons have Tommy secured in their apartment. Tommy escapes and climbs onto the roof, and he is pursued by Mr. Kellerson to a nearby building that is in the process of being demolished. The police officer suggests that Tommy went to see his mother, and he and Mr. Woodry leave the tenement. Tommy sees his father leave in his car and shouts for him, the sound of which alerts Mr. Kellerson to Tommy's location. The chase resumes with Tommy's finding the body of the dead sailor and then scrambling upstairs; when Kellerson follows, the stairwell collapses, leaving him struggling to gain sure footing as he continues grasping for Tommy. Tommy pushes a rafter aside, causing it to collapse and send Kellerson falling to his death, but the young boy is left stranded on the remainder of the beam suspended many stories above the ground. Neighbors hear his cries for help and send for fire and rescue personnel. A collapsable net is set up below Tommy, and he is encouraged to jump to safety before the beam collapses.

Tommy explains everything as he is escorted to a police cruiser, including where to find Mrs. Kellerson and the murder victim. His father assures him how proud he is as they ride to the police station, and Tommy promises to stop inventing stories.

Cast

Production

The story "The Boy Cried Murder" was published in 1947 and optioned by RKO who assigned Fredrick Ullman to produce. Ullman had been head of RKO's documentary and shorts department. Dickie Tyler, who had been in The Bells of St Marys and Christopher Blake was mentioned as a possible star. [5] The film was to be made at RKO's Pathe Studio in New York. [6]

Mel Dinelli, who had written The Spiral Staircase for RKO production chief Dore Schary, adapted the story for the screen, and the movie was given the title of The Window. [7] Ted Tetzlaff was given the job of directing. [8]

Ullman wanted to use a semi-documentary style as he came from that background. [9] RKO executives decided to film in Hollywood then changed their mind and went back to New York. Filming started 10 November 1947. It was the first movie RKO shot in that city in a long time. [10] By the time that the film was ready for release in 1948, the millionaire Howard Hughes had taken over the studio and refused to release it, saying it wouldn't make any money and that Bobby Driscoll wasn't much of an actor. However, in 1949, he was persuaded to release it, and it became a critical and financial success, earning many times its production costs. Driscoll was awarded the Juvenile Oscar for his outstanding performance in it.

Driscoll was under contract with Walt Disney, which "loaned" him to RKO for this film.

Reception

Critical response

When the film was first released, The New York Times lauded the film:

The striking force and terrifying impact of this RKO melodrama is chiefly due to Bobby's brilliant acting, for the whole effect would have been lost were there any suspicion of doubt about the credibility of this pivotal character. Occasionally, the director overdoes things a bit in striving for shock effects, such as when the half-conscious boy teeters on the rail of a fire-escape or is trapped on a high beam in an abandoned house on the verge of collapse. However, though you may be aware of contrivance in these instances, it is not likely that you will remain immune to the excitement. Indeed, there is such an acute expression of peril etched on the boy's face and reflected by his every movement as he flees death in the crumbling house that one experiences an overwhelming anxiety for his safety. [11]

Decades later, in 2003, critic Dennis Schwartz discussed the noir aspects of the film as well as its depiction of the challenges facing parents living in the inner city in the mid-20th century:

The city slum is pictured as not an easy place to raise a child, as there appears no safe place to play. Though the times have changed, this taut tale nevertheless remains gripping and realistic. The modern city is not any less dangerous than the postwar years of the 1940s (undoubtedly even more dangerous). This film noir thriller exploits the meaning of the American dream to work hard for all the material things that were becoming available and ultimately find a utopia in the suburbs, as it cries out for the children left to their own devices to survive in such harsh surroundings as their parents have become too busy to raise them properly. [12]

TV Guide in its 2008 assessment also praised the thriller, especially Tetzlaff's highly effective composition of scenes and his direction of the camera:

...this incredibly tense nail-biter stars Driscoll as a young boy who has a habit of crying wolf...The Window presents a frightening vision of helplessness, vividly conveying childish frustration at being dismissed or ignored by one's parents. Director and onetime cameraman Tetzlaff adroitly injects a maximum of suspense into the film, enabling the audience to identify with Driscoll's predicament and to view his parents as evil, almost as evil as the murderers themselves. Having photographed Hitchcock's Notorious just three years before, Tetzlaff had, without a shadow of a doubt, learned something of his suspense-building craft from the master of that art (as did just about every working director)...An exceptional film. [13]

Awards

Wins

Honors

Nominations

Adaptations

The film has been remade three times: [14] [15]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cornell Woolrich</span> American novelist (1903–1968)

Cornell George Hopley Woolrich was an American novelist and short story writer. He sometimes used the pseudonyms William Irish and George Hopley.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dore Schary</span> American dramatist and film producer (1905-1980)

Isadore "Dore" Schary was an American playwright, director, and producer for the stage and a prolific screenwriter and producer of motion pictures. He directed one feature film, Act One, the film biography of his friend, playwright and theatre director Moss Hart. He became head of production at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and replaced Louis B. Mayer as president of the studio in 1951.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bobby Driscoll</span> American actor (1937–1968)

Robert Cletus Driscoll was an American actor who performed on film and television from 1943 to 1960. He starred in some of the Walt Disney Studios' best-known live-action pictures of that period: Song of the South (1946), So Dear to My Heart (1949), and Treasure Island (1950), as well as RKO's The Window (1949). He served as the animation model and provided the voice for the title role in Peter Pan (1953). He received an Academy Juvenile Award for outstanding performances in So Dear to My Heart and The Window.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Charles Vidor</span> American film director

Charles Vidor was a Hungarian film director. Among his film successes are The Bridge (1929), Double Door (1934), The Tuttles of Tahiti (1942), The Desperadoes (1943), Cover Girl (1944), Together Again (1944), A Song to Remember (1945), Over 21 (1945), Gilda (1946), The Loves of Carmen (1948), Rhapsody (1954), Love Me or Leave Me (1955), The Swan (1956), The Joker Is Wild (1957), and A Farewell to Arms (1957).

<i>The Spiral Staircase</i> (1946 film) 1946 film by Robert Siodmak

The Spiral Staircase is a 1946 American psychological horror film directed by Robert Siodmak and starring Dorothy McGuire, George Brent, and Ethel Barrymore. Set over the course of one evening, the film follows a mute young woman in an early-20th century Vermont town who is stalked and terrorized in a rural mansion by a serial killer targeting women with disabilities. Kent Smith, Rhonda Fleming, Gordon Oliver and Elsa Lanchester appear in supporting roles. It was adapted for the screen by Mel Dinelli from the novel Some Must Watch (1933) by Ethel Lina White.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jon Hall (actor)</span> American actor (1915–1979)

Jon Hall was an American film actor known for playing a variety of adventurous roles, as in 1937's The Hurricane, and later when contracted to Universal Pictures, including Invisible Agent and The Invisible Man's Revenge and six films he made with Maria Montez. He was also known to 1950s fans as the creator and star of the Ramar of the Jungle television series which ran from 1952 to 1954. Hall directed and starred in two 1960s sci-fi films in his later years, The Beach Girls and the Monster (1965) and The Navy vs. the Night Monsters (1966).

<i>So Dear to My Heart</i> 1948 film by Walt Disney

So Dear to My Heart is a 1948 American live-action/animated comedy-drama film produced by Walt Disney and released by RKO Radio Pictures. Its world premiere was in Chicago, Illinois, on November 29, 1948. Like 1946's Song of the South, the film combines animation and live action. It is based on the 1943 Sterling North book Midnight and Jeremiah. The book was revised by North to parallel the film's storyline amendments and then re-issued under the same title as the film.

<i>Born to Kill</i> (1947 film) 1947 film noir directed by Robert Wise

Born to Kill is a 1947 RKO Pictures American film noir starring Lawrence Tierney, Claire Trevor and Walter Slezak with Esther Howard, Elisha Cook Jr., and Audrey Long in supporting roles. The film was director Robert Wise's first film noir production, preceding his later work on The Set-Up (1949) and The Captive City (1952).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tom Conway</span> British actor (1904–1967)

Tom Conway was a British film, television, and radio actor. He is remembered for playing suave adventurer The Falcon in a series of 1940s films and psychiatrist Dr. Louis Judd in Cat People (1942) and The Seventh Victim (1943).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jerome Cowan</span> American actor (1897–1972)

Jerome Palmer Cowan was an American stage, film, and television actor.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chester Conklin</span> American actor and comedian (1886–1971)

Chester Cooper Conklin was an early American film comedian who started at Keystone Studios as one of Mack Sennett’s Keystone Cops, often paired with Mack Swain. He appeared in a series of films with Mabel Normand and worked closely with Charlie Chaplin, both in silent and sound films.

John Paxton was an American screenwriter.

<i>Treasure Island</i> (1950 film) 1950 film by Byron Haskin

Treasure Island is a 1950 adventure film produced by RKO-Walt Disney British Productions, adapted from Robert Louis Stevenson's 1883 novel of the same name. Directed by Byron Haskin, it stars Bobby Driscoll as Jim Hawkins and Robert Newton as Long John Silver. Treasure Island was Disney's first completely live-action film and the first screen version of Treasure Island made in color. It was filmed in the United Kingdom on location and at Denham Film Studios, Buckinghamshire.

<i>Riffraff</i> (1947 film) 1947 film directed by Ted Tetzlaff

Riff-Raff is a 1947 American film noir starring Pat O'Brien, Anne Jeffreys and Walter Slezak. It was directed by Ted Tetzlaff, who later directed The Window (1949) and worked as a cinematographer for over 100 films, including Alfred Hitchcock's Notorious (1946). The music was composed by Roy Webb and Joan Whitney.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Henry Levin (director)</span> American film director

Henry Levin began as a stage actor and director but was most notable as an American film director of over fifty feature films. His best known credits were Jolson Sings Again (1949), Journey to the Center of the Earth (1959) and Where the Boys Are (1960).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cecil Kellaway</span> South African actor (1890–1973)

Cecil Lauriston Kellaway was a South African character actor. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor twice, for The Luck of the Irish (1948) and Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967).

Seton Ingersoll Miller was an American screenwriter and producer. During his career, he worked with film directors such as Howard Hawks and Michael Curtiz. Miller received two Oscar nominations and won once for Best Screenplay for the 1941 fantasy romantic comedy film, Here Comes Mr. Jordan, along with Sidney Buchman.

<i>A Dangerous Profession</i> 1949 film by Ted Tetzlaff

A Dangerous Profession is a 1949 American film noir directed by Ted Tetzlaff, written by Warren Duff and Martin Rackin, and starring George Raft, Ella Raines and Pat O'Brien. The film was one of a series of thrillers in which Raft appeared in the late 1940s, with decreasing commercial results.

<i>Johnny Allegro</i> 1949 film by Ted Tetzlaff

Johnny Allegro is a 1949 American film noir directed by Ted Tetzlaff and starring George Raft. An ex-gangster (Raft), temporarily working as a federal agent, runs afoul of a counterfeiting crime lord (Macready) who enjoys hunting. It was one of several thrillers Raft made in the late 1940s.

<i>Gambling House</i> (film) 1951 film by Ted Tetzlaff

Gambling House is a 1951 American film noir crime film directed by Ted Tetzlaff and starring Victor Mature, Terry Moore and William Bendix.

References

  1. 1 2 "The Window: Detail View". American Film Institute. Retrieved February 2, 2016.
  2. ↑ Richard Jewell & Vernon Harbin, The RKO Story. New Rochelle, New York: Arlington House, 1982. p237
  3. ↑ "Variety". 14 October 2017. Retrieved 14 October 2017– via Internet Archive.
  4. ↑ Nevins, Francis M. (1988). Cornell Woolrich: First You Dream, Then You Die (New York, London, Tokyo: The Mysterious Press), pp. 332–333.
  5. ↑ Schallert, E. (Mar 13, 1947). "DRAMA AND FILM". Los Angeles Times. ProQuest   165759512.
  6. ↑ "NEWS OF THE SCREEN". New York Times. Mar 13, 1947. ProQuest   107761937.
  7. ↑ "Of local origin". New York Times. Aug 1, 1947. ProQuest   107854608.
  8. ↑ Schallert, E. (Oct 1, 1947). "Cabot story promoter; 'winter theater' next". Los Angeles Times. ProQuest   165836287.
  9. ↑ A.H. WEILER. (Oct 26, 1947). "NOTES ABOUT PICTURES AND PEOPLE". New York Times. ProQuest   108055859.
  10. ↑ THOMAS F BRADY (Oct 28, 1947). "RKO WILL PRODUCE 'THE WINDOW' HERE". New York Times. ProQuest   108015071.
  11. ↑ T.M.P. (1949). "'The Window,' Depicting Terror of Boy in Fear of His Life, Opens at the Victoria"], full original film review, The New York Times, August 8, 1949, p. 10. Retrieved via ProQuest Historical Newspapers, subscription access through The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Library, April 28, 2022.
  12. ↑ The Window. Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews, film review, August 5, 2019. Last accessed: November 5, 2022.
  13. ↑ TV Guide Film review, 2008. Last accessed: April 5, 2008.
  14. ↑ Mayer, Geoff (September 13, 2012). Historical Dictionary of Crime Films. Scarecrow Press. p. 405. ISBN   9780810879003 . Retrieved 26 September 2017.
  15. ↑ DeGiglio-Bellemare, Mario; Ellbé, Charlie; Woofter, Kristopher (December 11, 2014). Recovering 1940s Horror Cinema: Traces of a Lost Decade. Lexington Books. p. 123. ISBN   9781498503808 . Retrieved 28 September 2017.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.