Peeping Tom was seen as offensive and immoral upon its initial release. It was blasted by critics and ruined the career of its brilliant director. Now it is seen as influential and ahead of its time. Having seen many stories that take the point-of-view of a killer in the years since then, it isn’t really shocking anymore. However, it is still tremendously effective and completely absorbing. It is different thematically from director Michael Powell’s other movies, yet it ranks as one of his best. Despite not having the creative kills of the modern slasher, it is as unsettling as any of them.
Mark lives alone on the upper floor of an apartment building he owns. By day, he works for a film studio. By night, he films models. He is always clutching a camera, obsessing about the private movie he is making.
This is a story about voyeurism. Mark does not participate in his life; he watches it through his camera. Just as the viewer is essentially a participant, watching Mark and then experiencing Mark’s actions through his camera. It also equates direction with voyeurism, as Mark creates the perfect stage for his vision, then watches as his subject follows his commands. Powell doesn’t hammer those points in too forcefully, but the parallels are obvious.
Mark’s actions are definitely evil, yet Peeping Tom doesn’t seem to totally see him that way. It provides explanation (probably too much) for why he does what he does. Almost making him a victim himself. Scenes where he talks with his downstairs neighbor, a sweet young woman named Helen, show what his life could have been if it weren’t for the darkness inside him. He refuses to put Helen on camera, for fear of what that would cause him to do to her. This is a man fully consumed by his compulsion.
Their relationship could have made him sympathetic, but Powell does not make it easy to feel bad for him. There is one scene in particular, where we see him coach a trusting actress into position (physically and emotionally) for his deadly camera, that is absolutely chilling. He has the confidence and single-minded fixation of an artist in the process of turning their dream into a reality.
Michael Powell is one of the greatest British directors of all time. He is mostly known for his partnership with Emeric Pressburger, which produced stuff such as A Matter of Life and Death, The Black Narcissus, The Red Shoes and the masterpiece The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp. Though he did make six movies after Peeping Tom, it basically destroyed his popularity. When I first saw it, I was surprised at how deeply it dives into this world of sexuality and intimate violence. Similar to Psycho, it forces us to see through the eyes of a killer (quite literally in this case; the opening shot is a close-up of Mark’s eye), something that is pretty common these days.
What sets it apart, and allows it to really hold up, is the care Powell gives to his character study. Mark is a serial killer who delicately caresses his camera when he sets his sights on a target. He is also a lonely young man who gives a pin to the woman he likes and then innocently touches his chest in the same spot she has placed the pin on her body, just like a camera recording her movements. Showing a killer at work, while taking the time to humanize him, runs the risk of excusing his monstrous behavior. Peeping Tom does not do that. It never gives a reason why these women deserve to die, other than the fact that Mark cannot help himself.
With its off-screen murders, minimal amount of blood and absence of jump-scares, it may seem like a bit of a stretch to classify Peeping Tom as horror. I consider it to be horror both because it is clearly an inspiration for the slasher subgenre and because of the disturbing sense of dread I feel whenever Mark turns his beloved camera onto an unsuspecting woman. Nowadays art-house horror movies are all over the place. This is an early example of them. And still one of the best.
-Ben Pivoz
