The Window

A superior RKO B thriller variant on the boy who cried wolf fable, adapted from a short story by Cornell Woolrich. Driscoll is the kid who, from the fire escape one hot night, witnesses the couple in the apartment above killing a drunken seaman, only to have no one believe his story since they're all so used to his lying ways. Thrills begin when the culprits (Stewart and Roman) realise he knows the truth, and decide to ensure his silence. Pleasingly performed and shot, the film benefits from its evocative creation of the grimy New York tenements as a claustrophobic haven of crime and paranoia. Taut and gripping.