Look in Any Window (1961) User Reviews (14)

Dark side of suburban life

[Jimmy_the_Gent4 · 6/10 · 29 December 2017]

A teenager terrorizes his neighborhood by prowling around at night wearing a mask.

Paul Anka plays Craig the troubled teen, he also sings the title song which takes on a weird creepy feeling when played while he wanders aimlessly around town , stopping to look at romance magazines. It was not a hit though Anka had several successful songs around that time. His mother is played by Ruth Roman, a sexy and flirtatious woman and his father is a weak alcoholic (Alex Nicol). There is also an odd couple pair of cops looking into the prowling case, one a veteran who believes in beating confessions out of suspects and his young partner who is more understanding since he studied psychology.

This is a strangely effective film is made more sleazy because of the low budget and being filmed in black and white. It is almost like a David Lynch film if he were making films in the early 1960s. It is hard to find, I own it on a VHS copy made by the video company The Fang. It was transferred from a jumpy 16mm copy. This is worth seeing if you like low budget films about the darker, more lurid side of suburbia in the 1960s.

"I look in any window, I walk by any open door, to see if someone will love me,love me forever more."

[morrison-dylan-fan · 6/10 · 6 December 2019]

A few years ago on a poll taking place on IMDb's Classic Film board for the best films of 1961,I spotted fellow IMDber melvelvit-1 list a interesting looking "most wanted" title that I made a note on.

Planning to pick it up,I was surprised to find that despite some famous Pop stars in the main cast,the flick was not on disc or video! With X-Mas coming up,I took a gamble & searched for the first time in years,and was pleased to see the window open.

View on the film:

Peeping at the opened window with a stalking theme song tumbling in the background, the lone directing credit of Creature from the Black Lagoon producer William Alland cracks sizzling under the sun teen rebellion and broken suburban home with a bitter Film Noir atmosphere.

Closely working with cinematographer Wallace Kelley, Alland edges close to Drive-In teen thrills of wide-shot peeping tom and lingering panning shots up (clothed) women's bodies, but pauses, in order to take a full view of the stylishly dissolving overlapping images peeling away at the broken foundation of the households.

Peeping at the window behind the white-picket fence, the screenplay by Laurence E. Mascott rolls it up with tasty overripe dialogue, as the heightened Melodrama of Jackie and Jay Fowler's crumbling marriage, being grounded with their increasingly isolated son Craig picking up a peeping tom habit. Singing the eerie title track,Paul Anka gives a coiled up fused spin as teen son Craig Fowler, whose growth into adulthood has Anka incise Craig fiery, isolating desire to look in any window.

no nostalgic value

[SnoopyStyle · 4/10 · 29 June 2021]

It's the suburbs and a peeping Tom is on the loose. He scares people with a disturbing mask. Craig Fowler (Paul Anka) is a disinterested teen and the only son of a loveless marriage.

Paul Anka may be a teenage music icon at the time but he's not a charismatic actor. Quite frankly, he would barely be cast as a supporting actor if not for his name. The problem is that he's way before my time and holds no nostalgic value for me. He's just another stiff amateur actor and he's not holding the screen. I do have to admire that a pop idol is willing to play a creepy character but nothing else.

Peeping Paul Anka

[wes-connors · 3/10 · 30 June 2012]

A heat wave in suburbia arouses a Southern California community. Feeling hot and not knowing what to do with it, bullied teenager Paul Anka (as Craig Fowler) becomes "The Masked Prowler" - actually, he's a "peeping Tom" sleazing out for looks at women who've been dressing down for the warm weather. Scaling fences in his tight tee-shirt and frightening mask, Mr. Anka is a hoot and a holler. His lack of sexual socialization skills may be due to poor parenting - specifically, they are flirty frustrated mother Ruth Roman (as Jackie Fowler) and alcoholic mechanic father Alex Nicol (as Jay Fowler). Anka's papa gets laid off and his mama gets laid on - by amorous and available neighbor Jack Cassidy (as Gareth Lowell)...

Newly arrived Italian widower George Dolenz (as Carlo) wants to take care of Mr. Cassidy's "lonesome" wife Carole Mathews (as Betty Lowell) while Anka aches to make their daughter Gigi Perreau (as Eileen Lowell) squeal on a trampoline. Hoping to catch Anka in action, veteran policemen Robert Sampson (as Lindstrom) and his amateur psychologist partner Dan Grayam (as Webber) investigate. It all leads to a boozy 4th of July pool party. This may your only chance to see the fathers of future "Screen Gems" contracted singer/actors Micky Dolenz (of "The Monkees") and David Cassidy (of "The Partridge Family") in the same film. You'll also hear Anka's relatively rare, moody "Look in Any Window" title song.

*** Look in Any Window (1/29/61) William Alland ~ Paul Anka, Ruth Roman, Alex Nicol, Carole Mathews

Peeping Paul and Young Cassidy

[telegonus · 7/10 · 21 July 2006]

This little 1961 movie has a trashy feeling to it, not helped by its very low budget. Yet it has a kind of sincerity as well, of the sort one used to find in high school civics classes. It's an odd mix of a movie, worth watching once. It's evocative of its era, the waning of the Eisenhower years, just past, and the start of the New Frontier, just beginning. The movie has the conservative mood of the fifties in some scenes, while in other respects it feels almost like a low budget attempt to make a Euopean-style art film in America. Director William Alland's style suggests a touch of Nicholas Ray here, a little John Cassavettes there, with a dash of John Frankenheimer and Arthur Penn thrown in for good measure.

Okay, enough name dropping. From what I recall of the story it revolves around a troubled teen (Paul Anka) who has become a "peeing tom", a voyeur in other words. What drives him seems not to be sexual urges so much as a desire to understand what "normal" is (I'm with you there, Paul). In this sense the story, though semi-sensational for its day, must come off as a little sad today. Since I haven't seen the film in decades I can't say for sure. As at least an attempt to probe into the true nature of dysfunctional or, if you will, troubled families, the film deserves praise for at least bringing the (at the time) hot topic up in the first place.

It's too bad that Paul Anka wasn't much of an actor. What's worse, there's something unappealing about him, not quite creepy but unsympathetic, that makes his troubled teen come off as stranger than he should. As the hypocritical grownups, Ruth Roman, Alex Nicol and, especially Jack Cassidy, are all fine. The latter is surprisingly unhammy, and his playing here much stronger than it would be a decade later, when his acting got slicker and somewhat campy. I find his work in the movie actually touching at times, which is not, I suspect, what the actor or director intended.

Sounds lurid, but pretty tame

[Wizard-8 · 28 July 2012]

Singer and teen idol Elvis Presley got big budget musicals to work on. Singer and teen idol Pat Boone got to work on big budget movies. However, singer and teen idol Paul Anka got "Look In Any Window" among the few (and equally low budget) movie offers he got. Watching it, one has to admire the guts of Anka to appear in a movie where he plays a mentally disturbed teenager who likes to peep in the windows of his neighbors. I have to wonder what Anka's teen followers thought of Anka after watching this, though I am pretty confident in guessing what they thought of the movie as a whole. Despite its lurid description, the movie is pretty boring for the most part. Anka doesn't get to do much peeping, and he's actually off- screen for large chunks of time. It's no wonder this movie is pretty hard to find.

Bad porno lines w/o the nudity

[chipsdipsanddorks · 3/10 · 25 June 2021]

So the reason this did not make a good movie or was even remembered as a good film: The story is about every neighbor in the neighborhood being either a bored housewife or a cheating man. What makes this a porno is the corny porn lines like, - you like chocolate cake, would you like to try some, come on over - or - I forgot to buy light bulbs for the house, but we can light a candle - or- night swimming relaxes me because I have been so tense. The best part was a husband that heads to Vegas in his convertible, but stops in front of the female neighbor. She then jumps in and they make out in front of their two houses....really???

The entire movie is set around a group of sexually charged adults who are unhappy in their own lives, so they hook up with the next door neighbors. The only thing missing is the delivery guy saying he has a package for the lady.

Interesting movie

[ljon-98970 · 7/10 · 24 April 2022]

Although this movie contained some unrealistic moments, I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was like a time capsule of 1961, a time I well remember! Women were expected to be only housewives, the men cheated, and the cops! The movie is an off-beat criticism of the era (which deserved criticism, believe me), and had strong performances, including by Paul Anka.....Who knew he could act? It also had a pretty good screen play with some good lines.... It captured the claustrophobic angst of the era, when women were trapped in marriages, and all of the old traditions were on the line. It was inexpensively made, I know, and this added to the gritty realism of the result. More money and technicolor would have ruined it, I'm sure.

Suburban Confidential.

[planktonrules · 4/10 · 29 June 2021]

"Look in Any Window" is a cheap, sleazy exploitation film about the shenanigans going on behind the scenes in suburban America. While it could have been well made and intelligent, the filmmakers really just wanted sensationalism. However, despite being pretty crass, it is entertaining.

The film is like a soap opera and it consists of many different vignettes involving really screwed up people. The most obviously messed up person is Craig, played by Paul Anka. He is an out of work teen who loves peeking in windows. Eventually, his behavior escalates and the police are looking to find him. His father is emotionally and physically impotent and the film is trying to say this is why the young man is a creepy sex offender...which is a bit of a stretch. As for nearly all the adults in the film, they seem to love cheating on their spouses and are too wrapped up in themselves to notice that Craig is a real head case!

The film often features very broad acting that is anything but subtle. The worst of these is played by Alex Nicol, who is Craig's alcoholic father. Subtle, he is not! But none of the characters seemed subtle...not even the cops investigating the peeping Tom case! I am a bit surprised the film didn't cast Jayne Mansfield or Mamie Van Doren as well...they would have fit right in to the story. Overall, a bad but fun movie...the type you watch if you could use a laugh or if you like over-the-top stories.

Raunchy in rundown Reseda

[mls4182 · 7/10 · 1 May 2022]

Flabby Paul Anna needs love but he's going about it all wrong. He is given a bunch of bad examples. All the adults are in love - with someone else's spouse.

Filmed in the San Fernando Valley town of Reseda. It used to be your basic lower middle class neighborhood. Now it is an absolute dump.

70s p-rno movie ahead of its time

[ArtVandelayImporterExporter · 2/10 · 25 April 2022]

S3x-starved housewives, revealing clothing, a pool party, creeping husbands, peeping teen boy, h0rny teengirl, an assault or two, investigating cops, makeouts every 15 minutes or so.

Yup, this is a 70s p-rno, alright. Except in B&W and without the nudity.

Worth catching to see Ruth Roman in that lacey outfit for the first 20 minutes. And height-challenged Paul Anka's terrible performance.

Hypnotic "semi-sleazy" about America!

[shepardjessica · 8/10 · 22 August 2004]

I'm almost surprised that Paul Anka, who was a hit teen singer when he made this, didn't worry about being type-cast forever as a peeping tom, even though his parents are pretty worthless. Nevertheless, this little exploitation (TEEN) flick about social generation-gap stuff is right on the money, especially since most of the actors were professions.....But this has some creepy (not really sleazy) scenes but they always lead into TRYING TO DEAL WITH THE PROBLEM. The parents are drunks, cheating on their spouses, unattentive, and Paul Anka's character is similar to Tony Perkins in PSYCHO except he's not crazy or a murderer..he's just curious how other people live. Ruth Roman..I won't even go into how "cool" they cast the adults in this (for once) and the teenager characters do a good job.

This is not some Perv movie or anything (even for then) and I'm in my 50's and am an artist and Don't thinks it's some creepy thing...AND THERES VERY little humor to fake it. It's unfortunate how real these families in this little movie were (at the time in America) in an affluent, I guess, neighborhood, with the adults (FOR REAL) kind of being the screw-ups, teen-agers, lost, whatever), but if you can find it. I don't know if it's on DVD or Video, but it's a slice of somebody's life (well told) with a Zero budget..Check it!

"I look in any window.."

[hollywoodshack · 9/10 · 23 September 2018]

People can comment all they want about this being low, sleazy, sensationalistic, et cetera, but I found it a very thought provoking and disturbing film. Paul Anka's character Craig Fowler seemed to be such a great symbol as the neighbor Carlo (played by George Dolenz) explains, of the evils of everyone who voyeurs hours away watching the lives of strange people the media tells us are so important. Craig is soon unmasked, and it tells the characters they are as guilty as he might be to give him bad examples to feed his endless urge to spy and pry. Citizen Kane might have given William Alland some material to use for this movie since he played a reporter there who was always watching the drama unfold with his back turned to hide what he looked like. Plus, it always gave me a tent pole in junior high school to watch Jack Cassidy kiss Ruth Roman in the car before they sped away to Las Vegas.

I'm here for the camp

[RedCupCoffee · 10/10 · 3 March 2023]

This has to be the craziest, nuttiest movie I've seen but my god, is it blast. Every character is insane and over the top. I loved the scenery, it's the perfect swinging '60's in every single way. The story is absolutely not important but it's about literally swinging couples with a few rambunctious children running around causing chaos. It's movies like this that make me appreciate the simplicity of scripts back then. If it wasn't about aliens, outer space or nuclear war then it's about being bottled up, oppressed and acting out. This is the perfect rainy day movie for fun and mischief among friends.