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Many know the sad tale of the life of Bobby Driscoll who was Walt Disney's first live action child star paving the way for dozens more right down to today's Disney Channel. As Disney at the time The Window was made released their product through RKO Studios, RKO apparently had call on Driscoll's services and they got him to star in this sleeper of a noir film which I call children's noir.

Bobby is the son of Arthur Kennedy and Barbara Hale and he's got a big imagination forever telling tall tales. That's the problem, when he sees a real murder take place in an upstairs neighbor's apartment no one will believe him, not the cops, especially not his parents.

But murder was done in that apartment as drunk and free spending sailor Richard Benedict was done in by Paul Stewart and Ruth Roman. The body was disposed of in a condemned building next door.

In Disney products we've seen all kinds of kids put in harm's way of many a villain. But because it is a Disney film we all know nothing will happen. Not so here. Driscoll is in the mean streets of a big city and a really bad man is chasing him. You feel his fear.

The Window got an Oscar nomination in the film editing. Almost 70 years later it's still a thrilling film to watch and the cross cut editing has a lot to do with it. Don't miss this one if broadcast.

The central figure of 'The Window' was a slum ten-year-old boy (Bobby Driscoll), living in New York poor neighborhood and known to everyone there as a teller of fantastic stories…

His parents (Arthur Kennedy and Barbara Hale) warned him he must stop his fantasies… and what followed was a classic up-dating of the boy who cried 'wolf' once too often…

One stifling night, the boy climbed out on to a fire escape to seek cool air and, through a crack under a window blind, he witnessed a murder…

He knew no one would believe him although this time, for the first time, his story was true… He tried to tell his mother that he had seen a couple called Kellerson trying to rob a drunk and killing him in a fight: the boy got scolded for his imagination and sent to bed… His father locked him in for punishment; the boy escaped and took his story to the police station. A detective investigated, but could find no body, no signs of a struggle…

Now the awful irony: the guilty Kellersons learn through the detective that the boy had seen them committing the crime, and the boy's parents, with terrifyingly understandable logic, send the boy to the killers to apologize 'for spreading such an awful story about them'.

The Kellersons cannot decide: should they leave well alone, as nobody believes the boy; or should they commit another crime to cover the first?

'The Window' is a classic little second feature, entertaining and suspenseful; unfortunately it had few successful imitators

Young Bobby Driscoll (Tommy) makes up stories to his friends and to his parents. One night, he sleeps on the fire escape outside the apartment of Paul Stewart (Mr Kellerson) and Ruth Roman (Mrs Kellerson) where he witnesses them commit a murder. When he tells his parents Arthur Kennedy and Barbara Hale about it, they dismiss him. In fact, they punish him. Even the police don't believe him when he reports the murder to them. Poor kid. No-one believes him. It's not long before Paul Stewart and Ruth Roman find out that he knows something and set a plan in motion to silence him.

There are many tense scenes as Driscoll faces his nightmare all alone. The audience shares his fear as the killers have him next on their list. The acting is realistic as is the dialogue. The film also has eerie sections (eg, Ruth Roman outside Driscoll's window with a torch as he hides in his locked room) and dramatic moments (eg, when the killers kidnap Driscoll and put him in the back of a cab and they encounter a policeman). The strategy that Paul Stewart and Ruth Roman use to shut him up during the cab ride is genius. It's very funny and demonstrates perfect teamwork.

Children are usually annoying in films. Not here. A dramatic ending in a disused apartment block adds to the tension. Worth watching again. The way the movie is filmed and the location all add to the experience of a film that is actually quite scary in parts.

"The Window" is a rich and underrated tale of urban terror from a ten-year-old's perspective. Tommy Woodry is jolted from his innocent world of make believe games when he witnesses a murder in the middle of the night. Making the terror all the worse is that the murderers are his upstairs neighbors, the Kellertons, and neither the police nor his parents will believe his story. The terror grows darker when Tommy's only protection, his parents, leave for the night because of shift work and family illness. The music and lighting brilliantly reflect the evil that begins with nightfall and the removal of his parents. When the Kellertons kidnap Tommy, even pretending to be his parents to fool the police, bad "parents" replace the good ones. "The Window", in a way, is the opposite of the classic "These Three" of thirteen years earlier. In the latter, the lies of a young girl (Bonita Granville) regarding adult wrongdoing are believed without reservation, with swift and devastating consequences. "The Window" also nicely showcases the hard life of the working class in 1949: the only telephone is at the drug store and the apartments are cramped and dilapidated with no modern appliances. Paul Stewart, as Joe Kellerton, plays his villainous role with a cool, almost smug arrogance, while Bobby Driscoll, as Tommy, expertly handles the role of an innocent child drawn into the gritty ugliness of urban violence. The movie maintains a fast pace, with total suspense all the way to the nail-biting end, and every second of it is worth watching.

A belter of a B noir out of RKO. Story plays as a variant to the boy who cried wolf legend and finds young Bobby Driscoll as Tommy, a boy prone to telling tall tales. So when one night he spies upstairs neighbours murdering a man, nobody believes him...

The build up to the crime is considered, we are privy to Tommy's home life in a cramped New York tenement, his parents loyal and hard working and they have plenty of love for their fanciful son.

Once the crime is committed, a shocking incident compounded by the fact it's perpetrated by a normal looking male and female couple, a destitute pairing prepared to do the unthinkable just for cash, then things get real tense and the thrills begin to roll.

Tommy is now under threat from the killers and he needs to be silenced, so as the cramp confines of the hot and sweaty tenement area are vividly brought to life via noir visuals, Ted Tetzlaff (director) and his cinematographers (Robert De Grasse & William O. Steiner) excelling, the paranoia and tension builds to the point that the gripping finale acts as a merciful release.

Very well performed by a cast that also includes Paul Stewart, Ruth Roman, Arthur Kennedy and Barabara Hale, this late 1940s noir is highly recommended. 8/10