NYC Noir Double Feature: The Window and Deadline at Dawn

I was a little underwhelmed by the double feature today-"The Window" and "Deadline at Dawn"-with the latter film causing the most problems for me. I had a hard time finding the connection, but I guess it was about two people that we know are innocent-one because we see how he's telling the truth, and the other just by gut instinct-but are always thwarted by others-people who are usually portrayed as bigger. In one film it's parents and other adults, and in the other its just with people who have a higher status-cops, mobsters, etc.

The first film was:

The Window (1949) ***
73 Minutes
Directed by Ted Tetzlaff

With a story that is a cross between Hitchcock's later film "Rear Window" as well as the fable "The Boy Who Cried Wolf," The Window is about Young Tommy who loves to tell stories. He tells stories so much that his parents can hardly believe him anymore, even though they sometimes humor him with interest. One night Tommy ends up seeing the upstairs neighbor kill a man, but he doesn't see them move the body and hide it in the rooftop cellar because he's too busy waking his mother, who tells him that he had a nightmare. What comes next is a battle of truth and lies, as Tommy tries to let people know that the neighbors killed, but who would believe a kid, and his parents become increased with worry-when will he stop with the stories?

At 73 minutes, "The Window" doesn't fly by as you would assume, but it is packed with enough tension and action to keep you pleased. The performance by Tommy-played by Bobby Driscoll, who died at a tragic young age of thirty-one-is a bit hammy, and the script contains a lot of phrases like "Gee Pop" and "Golly!" An observation about these old movies that I made recently was that when you watch them, you have a hard time finding tension because you always know everything is going to be alright. It was important-people couldn't get away with crimes in film back in those days. It is more about "how" everything is tied up, instead of "what" will happen. And I knew the ending to "The Window"-I even almost knew the very last line-but it was exciting, and I was constantly entertained.

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Deadline at Dawn (1946) **
Directed by Harold Clurman

This is the film I had a problem with-very talky, kind of boring even, and at times it was overly complicated. "Deadline at Dawn" tells about a sailor getting ready to ship back out again, but first he is certain that he killed a woman. And him picks up a hostess at a club and the two of them try to find the real killer in the course of one night-hence the title. I personally found nothing special about this virtually unknown noir. It's unknown for a reason. The script is pretty bad, laughable even and not in that cool Bogart way. There are lines like "You guys are ziggy when you should be zaggy" or when a man is about to go into jail-"I never would have thought I would need to know how to play a harp." It almost exceeded cool noir language and went into just tacky and lazy writing. Some of those lines were a highlight just for the laughs, but for the most part this is a very unexciting story.

For more information on the NYC Noir Series, visit the Official Film Forum Website!