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"We’re a world of watchers, whether eyeing a good looker at the beach, or peering into outer space with our telescopes..."
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Although we value our privacy, we don't seem to value other folk's privacy very much and invasion of privacy is a modern fact of life. It's also a fact of life--or death--in classic horror and chiller films, where a lustful creature gets an eyeful and proceeds to wreck mayhem, all of which amounts to a fright film subgenre we call...
By JOE WINTERS Peek-a-boo…I see you! No, you’ve not tuned in to an online version of "Baby’s First Pop-up Book." Peek-a-boo is an example of how early in life we become conditioned to the simple act of looking. It’s an act that takes on different methods and objectives during the various stages of life. We’re a world of watchers, whether eyeing a good looker at the beach, or, peering into outer space with our telescopes. And then, there’s television, which made it easier than ever to look in at nearly anything or anybody.
Voyeurism, by definition, is the obsessive observation of sordid or sensational subjects, often sexual in nature. Renowned director Alfred Hitchcock further popularized voyeurism in what is considered by many to be his greatest film, Rear Window (Paramount, 1954). A professional photographer (James Stewart), while recuperating from a broken leg, has little to do, so he takes to watching events unfold across the yard outside his apartment and inside the windows of other apartments. An seemingly tireless newlywed couple, a lonely spinster, and an energetic blonde are among the objects of Stewart’s ogling.
But so is a man (Raymond Burr) suspected of murdering and dismembering his nagging wife. By making us watch, which we’re only too willing to do, Hitchcock brilliantly defines cinema itself as it has seldom been before or since. Voyeurism in the movies had certainly existed before Rear Window and in horror films at least as far back as Nosferatu (1922), where Count Orlock (Max Schreck) eyed his beautiful victim from his window and through hers. As Dracula (1931), Bela Lugosi looked longingly up at the window before putting the bite on one victim.
King Kong (1933), after first grabbing the wrong gal (and dropping her to her death), managed to look in the correct window toward the object of his affection (Fay Wray) and give her a lift to the top of the Empire State Building. Even nice guy Larry Talbot (Lon Chaney Jr.) used a telescope, not to look at the heavens, but to check out heavenly Evelyn Ankers before poor Larry would have other things on his mind as The Wolf Man (1941). But it seems that after Rear Window it became fashionable for people (and others) to peek in. See for yourself.
In Revenge Of The Creature (1955), the Gill Man breathes heavily as he watches lovely Lori Nelson get ready for beddy-bye. During his Las Vegas rampage, The Amazing Colossal Man (1957) looks in at a woman taking a bath. In I Was A Teenage Frankenstein (1957), the poor kid, with a face even Whit Bissell couldn’t love, took time to check out a hot blonde before crashing through the glass and acting on his urges by killing the poor gal. John Carradine as the extraterrestrial Cosmic Man (1958) sneaks a casual glance as he glides along outside the window of another hottie. The panther-man in the Philippine-made Terror Is A Man (1959) takes a gander at Greta Thyssen as she prepares to turn in. Rather than disturb her, the beast man moves on and kills a different woman.
Even big bugs were not above feasting their big eyes on ladies who could only satisfy the urge for a quick snack. Nevertheless, the Tarantula (1955) only watched Mara Corday undressing before it leveled the house (and Leo G. Carroll). In Beginning Of The End (1957), a gal in a towel gets an unwelcome intrusion by one of the giant grasshoppers invading Chicago, while The Deadly Mantis (1957) momentarily has a thing for a girl (Alix Talton) in a fur, before bringing down the building. Windows aren’t the only points from which monsters can satisfy their viewing needs. The Creature From The Black Lagoon (1954) swims directly beneath Julie Adams without her knowing it. In The Day The World Ended (1956), a mutated being watches Lori Nelson (again) take a dip. And The Monster Of Piedras Blancas (1959) takes notice of a young woman skinny-dipping in the ocean, but waits until later to make his move back at the house. All these brutes come to a bad end.
As Hitchcock (and Hitchcock’s dad) might have said, "This is what happens to bad little boys." And that goes for human peepers, too. A mute handyman views yet another enticing female swimming before he falls under the control of The Beast With 1,000,000 Eyes (1955). And another handyman ventures from his shack (lined with pinups) and sets his sights on a bathing beauty, then on the title femme fatale of Terror From The Year 5,000 (1958) before he, too, pays the price. While most of these films seemed to tell us that women were there to be looked at, or rather to be looked at being looked at, the handling of most of their male companions was done with a more in-your-face approach. Obligatory beefcake shots of bare-chested Richard Carlson and Richard Denning (in Creature From The Black Lagoon), John Agar and John Bromfield (in Revenge Of The Creature), Richard Derr (Terror Is A Man), and Gary Conway (I Was A Teenage Frankenstein) were presented in a less covert manner.
The result was doubtless pleasing to their fans, but the way in which many women were viewed, by contrast, gives you an idea of the voyeuristic double standard of the time, and a standard that had existed long before and long since. With all that scrutinizing in the 1950’s well under way, leave it to Mr. Hitchcock to bring voyeurism to its next level with Psycho (1960), where Norman Bates eyes Janet Leigh through a hole in the wall, triggering his own urges and bringing out the Mother in him.
That same year’s Peeping Tom (from distinguished director Michael Powell), while every bit as shocking as Psycho, didn’t benefit from Hitch’s brand of promotional showmanship and clout. And Peeping Tom debuted in Great Britain, where critics by that time seemed intent on making an example of a trend toward sadistic content in films. Peeping Tom failed at the box office and basically ruined Powell’s career. Today its regarded as a classic, and deservedly so. With its psychotic protagonist (Karl Boehm) armed with a movie camera (and something extra), the film had quite a bit to say, not only about voyeurism, but, as did Rear Window, about cinema itself.
Certainly, there have been many more peepers in the years since, but during that brief period, voyeurism on celluloid really took off. Screens that watch us are nothing new, either. The 1956 film version of George Orwell’s 1949 novel 1984 had them everywhere. And today, in the age of so-called reality TV, not to mention web cams, there seems practically no place on Earth remote enough to have a little privacy.
As the ever-watched and watchful residents of The Village in TV’s The Prisoner would say: "Be seeing you." Thanks, Joe! Definitely, part of the guilty pleasure of cinema is "peeping" into the lives of others and in horror films, that peeping can be taken to deadly extremes. With all the micro cameras in use these days and the willingness of some to put anything on video for a buck, today's world even surpasses the peeping terror on the screen. Article copyright © Joe Winters |
