Film: Peeping Tom

Director: Michael Powell

101min.

Cast: Carl Boehm, Anna Massey, Moira Shearer

“Peeping Tom and Fellini’s 8 1/2 are the two great films that deal with the philosophy and danger of filmmaking.”
— Martin Scorsese

“Obsession…Of the act of filmmaking. An obsession that can tilt into madness. For me, Peeping Tom is the purest expression of that dangerous state of mind.” – Martin Scorsese

One of the most controversial films of the 1960s explores the darkest corner of the “Male Gaze,” taking the Hitchcockian voyeurism to its limit. In what is now considered to be a masterpiece – and the first slasher film – Peeping Tom dares us to sympathize a sensitive film studio focus puller Mark Lewis (Carl Boehm) who is battling an unspeakable violent obsession.  While Lewis moonlights as a shy private photographer of attractive women, he is also creating his own terrifying “documentary” of the women’s final expressions. The film also starts the great Moira Shearer, who starred in Powell’s ballet film The Red Shoes, and Anna Massey, who tries to find the humanity in this damaged killer’s soul. Director Powell’s career was derailed by the critical backlash to the film, though he would live to see The Guardian rate Peeping Tom the 10th Best Horror Film of all time and director Martin Scorsese sponsor a new highly praised print for the New York Film Festival in 1979.