Favorite movies that have had an impact on me - #3 - Rear Window (1954): I love all of Alfred Hitchcock's films, but this is probably my favorite. There is so much here. Great acting by Jimmy Stewart, Grace Kelly and Thelma Ritter. A suspenseful murder mystery. Amazing set design. But what really makes the movie great is the exploration of voyeurism, an activity that is at the very core of viewing movies.
The recent Academy Awards have gotten me thinking about my all-time favorite films and that list inevitably includes more than a few titles by Alfred Hitchcock. It's hard to pick a favorite from so many great movies, but Rear Window has always been at the top of the list. Thinking about Hitchcock and Kim Novak makes me realize that I need to write about Vertigo, soon. But in the meantime, here is a post from 2012, one of Hitch's (and any) best movies ever — Rear Window.
I've always been a huge fan of Alfred Hitchcock's movies. Vertigo is probably the ultimate expression of his recurring themes of mistaken identity and the ultimate unattainable female. The Birds and Psycho are both terrific horror movies, depicting monsters from without and within. But Rear Window is not only a great artistic achievement, but it is also one of his most entertaining films.
Thelma Ritter, Grace Kelly and Jimmy Stewart look out the window, "I'm not much on rear window ethics."
The blatant voyeurism in Rear Window is the perfect metaphor for what it is to go to the movies. Hitchcock's hero, Jimmy Stewart, plays L. B. "Jeff" Jeffries, a photographer who specializes in far-flung travel and exciting assignments — the more remote and dangerous the better. But after deciding to shoot a high-speed auto race from within the track (and being hit by a race car and sidelined with a broken leg), the itinerant photographer is stuck, going stir crazy in his New York City one-bedroom apartment, during a long hot summer with nothing to do. He begins passing his time by spying on his neighbors for entertainment, through the zoom lens on his camera.
His visiting nurse Stella, played by Thelma Ritter, tells Jeff, "We've become a race of Peeping Toms." She is initially bothered by Jeff's curiosity, but luckily for the audience her own desire to know what's happening across Jeff's courtyard matches ours. She joins Jeff in watching the neighbors and even gives them nicknames, like "Miss Torso" and "Miss Lonelyhearts". Tuned in regularly to everyone's daily routines, Jeff begins to notice that one of the couples, a middle-aged husband and his bedridden wife, may be acting in a peculiar manner. "I've seen bickering and family quarrels and mysterious trips at night, and knives and saws and ropes, and now since last evening, not a sign of the wife. How do you explain that?"
Miss Lonelyhearts is an unhappy single woman who Jeff watches go on unsuccessful dates
Miss Torso
Stella and Jeff's girlfriend, Lisa Fremont, played to the hilt of 1950s allure by Grace Kelly, at first try to persuade Jeff that he is imagining things, but they can't help looking and getting caught up in all of the rear window dramas. It's all fun for Jeff, Lisa and Stella to play a guessing game of unraveling the mysteries of their neighbor's lives — until they realize that they have stumbled upon a murder, and then the game becomes deadly serious.
Middle-aged couple with dog they treat like a child
Middle-aged couple without dog or child - the Thorwalds
Hitchcock captures the close quarters that come with city living - the proximity, the curiosity, and the assumptions we make about our neighbors - the feeling that we "know" people that we have never spoken to simply because we see them every day. He created the entire apartment complex in a single set, complete with action on the street beyond Jeff's camera's line of sight. It's an amazing achievement. As he toldFrançois Truffaut, "It was a possibility of doing a purely cinematic film. You have an immobilized man looking out. That's one part of the film. The second part shows what he sees and the third part shows how he reacts. This is actually the purest expression of a cinematic idea."
Jeff's summer is spent sweltering while he watches his neighbors in the heat and intimacy of their lives. Lisa gently presses him to heat up their own relationship, while he continues to push her away, afraid of commitment and losing his life of adventure. In Jeff's eyes Lisa and he are completely mis-matched. Anyone looking out their rear window and in at them would see that she is perfect for him. Stewart and Kelly have wonderful chemistry.
The Sculptor
The Composer (with Hitchcock making his cameo, winding a clock)
The movie could be viewed as simply a suspense thriller with a romantic subplot and it would still be top-notch. But I see Rear Window as an elaborate mating ritual between Lisa and Jeff, with the emphasis on their romance and Jeff's fears about their future. I think Hitchcock is most interested in the interplay between all the couples, with the thriller plot a perfect structure to tell their stories of loneliness and search for love. Jeff is not only watching his neighbors from his window but trying on each of their identities as a possible outcome with Lisa.
"Miss Torso" and "Miss Lonelyhearts" are two extremes of the lives led by single women. A male songwriter and a female sculptor are each channeling their romantic energies into their art. There are three couples - the young sex-crazed newlyweds; a couple, not far from the age of Jeff and Lisa, but whose lives are distinctly less glamorous, with a dog they treat as their baby; and Lars Thorwald (Raymond Burr) and his nagging, bedridden wife - the couple no one would want to become but Jeff fears he and Lisa might.
The Newlyweds
As Jeff tries to decide which of these scenarios best fit his romance with Lisa, she decides to toss out all of Jeff's potential relationship stereotypes, and goes into action. She enters his view by leaving the apartment and their theorizing behind and crossing the courtyard to actually investigate. "Why would Thorwald want to kill a little dog? Because it knew too much?" She proves herself as adventurous and risk-taking (if not more so) than Jeff, by sneaking into Thorwald's apartment and stealing Mrs. Thorwald's wedding ring, helping to prove Jeff's theories about the woman's murder and symbolically securing a ring for herself and Jeff.
Jeff becomes so wrapped up in watching the drama being played out, so excited by her audacity, that even when Lisa puts herself in an extremely dangerous situation, he can't keep himself from looking. And neither can we. The only thing that finally breaks his view out the window is when Thorwald himself comes over for a visit ...
Rear Window is just as thrilling to watch today as it must have been when it was initially released in 1954. Hitchcock uses the murder mystery format to tell deeper stories about loneliness, city life, fears of intimacy, and the good and bad places where love might lead. No matter what your views are on "rear window ethics" as Lisa refers to them, the viewer will be immensely grateful that Alfred Hitchcock created this glimpse into others' lives, before the neighbors got wise and pulled the curtains.
François Truffaut, Alfred Hitchcock, Helen G. Scott, "Hitchcock", Google Books
Today is National Alfred Hitchcock Day. I'm not sure exactly why, but I really don't care, as any opportunity to celebrate Hitch is appreciated. My movie-buff parents introduced me to the master at a young age, via his movies on television. I'm not sure which one I saw first exactly, but suspect it was Shadow of A Doubt, with Joseph Cotton as Uncle Charlie. Still one of my favorites, and probably why I prefer the black and white, atmospheric Hitchcock films to big screen confections like To Catch A Thief.
Hitchcock was such a meticulous artist that it is hard to pick a favorite film. He started making films in the 1920s, and many of them are definitely worth a look, but the ones I hold dear and that have forever influenced the art of cinema are from the mid-'30s and onwards. Here are twelve of his absolute best (I couldn't narrow it down to ten):
Rebecca (1940) - Hitchcock may have had problems working with demanding producer David O. Selznick on his first major Hollywood studio film, but the result is flawless, and a Best Picture winner to boot.
On the set of Suspicion
Suspicion (1941) - This may be considered a minor Hitchcock, in part because the director himself complained for years how he had to alter the ending to suit the studio, but Cary Grant and Joan Fontaine are wonderful together, and Hitch does allow Grant to indulge in his dark side, while maintaining his humor and charm — the perfect anti-hero.
Shadow of a Doubt (1943) - Joseph Cotton helps the director turn the usual depiction of small-town America inside out. With someone like Uncle Charlie on the loose in our towns and our homes, no one is quite safe. And Teresa Wright makes a winning female heroine, a young girl who rescues her family while having to grow up fast and watch her dream man turn into a nightmare. This is such a great, creepy film.
Filming Shadow of a Doubt
Notorious (1946) - The ultimate Hitchcock romance, with Cary Grant as an abusive lover and Ingrid Bergman a woman who has hit such depths that she is willing to marry another man (Claude Rains, a Nazi) to please him. It also includes one of the sexiest, longest kisses in screen history, as Grant and Bergman try to accomplish a spy maneuver in her husband's wine cellar, but can't hide their passion for one another.
Strangers on a Train (1951) - When Robert Walker says "Criss Cross" to Farley Granger as they share a train compartment the movie takes Granger down the rabbit hole and the audience with him. Walker has come up with the idea for the perfect murder — two complete strangers each perform a murder for one another. And he's not joking. The film includes so many wonderful Hitchcock details and set pieces — a woman's eyeglasses, the clue of a cigarette lighter, the ending on a fairground carousel. A masterpiece.
Dial M for Murder (1954) - Hitchcock was experimenting with 3D with this film, his first starring screen muse Grace Kelly (and his first in color). But it is Ray Milland who steals the show as her murderous-plotting husband. He is ruthless, but also sympathetic and unfailingly polite throughout the proceedings. A bit stagy, but still incredibly entertaining. Cary Grant wanted to play the role of the husband, but the studio didn't want him to portray a murderer.
Backstage on Rear Window
Rear Window (1954) - Hitchcock had the entire New York City apartment building courtyard where Jeff (James Stewart), who has broken his leg lives, constructed on the studio lot. It is the ultimate voyeuristic exercise, as a bored Jeff looks out his window at his neighbors and the audience eagerly joins him. What starts at first as spying on pretty girls and squabbling couples soon becomes looking in on a possible murder, with girlfriend Lisa (Grace Kelly) and nurse Stella (Thelma Ritter) eagerly joining the chase for clues. Hitchcock has a lot to say in Rear Window about how people live and how we observe each other. Each window in Jeff's apartment complex holds an interesting story, and a potential parallel or outcome to Jeff and Lisa's on-again, off-again relationship.
Vertigo (1958) - Many consider this Hitchcock's ultimate masterpiece (I might go for Rear Window), but it is certainly his most artistic, and probably most personal. He plays with the idea of female identity, as he allows Jimmy Stewart to make over Kim Novak in the vision of a dead love. Themes of love and death and sex abound, as Hitchcock has his actors take us through a dizzying, hypnotic tour of San Francisco. The film had been out of release for many years, and I saw it for the first time in a New York City theater in an '80s re-release. If only everyone could experience this film on a huge screen. It's time for another re-release!
Directing Kim Novak on Vertigo
North by Northwest (1959) - Cary Grant is the ultimate Hitchcock "wrong man" in this cross-country, wide-screen adventure. There are so many fabulous set-pieces, including the scene in the field with the crop-dusting plane, the face-off at the U.N. building, the climax at Mount Rushmore. Fun, fun, fun.
Psycho (1960) - So many horror films owe Psycho a debt, but most of them have never come close to the shock and brutality of this film. Hitchcock returned to black and white, as the famous shower scene would have been too much for 1960 audiences in color. Anthony Perkins turns in the performance of a lifetime as Norman Bates, while Janet Leigh's role helped redefine what could happen to a movie's leading lady.
The Birds (1963) - Hitchcock dabbles in horror and maybe even science-fiction with this wonderful, still-scary film. The tables are turning, and our avian friends are deciding that maybe they want the planet to themselves. But Hitchcock keeps everything personal, following a young, spoiled woman (Tippi Hedren) pursuing a romance with a man she has just met (Rod Taylor) in a small California seaside town. Their story becomes the backdrop for the much larger question — what is happening with all of the birds?
On the set of The Birds
Frenzy (1972) - A serial rapist/killer is on the loose in London. Hitchcock identifies the villain (Barry Foster) right away, and the audience can only wonder if he will be caught or if the "hero," the not-too-likable Richard Blaney (Jon Finch), will go to jail for his crimes instead. Frenzy was considered quite racy at the time, Hitchcock's first film to feature female nudity.
So now my only problem is which Hitch to view to honor the master today?
I've always been a huge fan of Alfred Hitchcock's movies. Vertigo is probably the ultimate expression of his recurring themes of mistaken identity and the ultimate unattainable female. The Birds and Psycho are both terrific horror movies, depicting monsters from without and within. But Rear Window is not only a great artistic achievement, but it is also one of his most entertaining films.
Thelma Ritter, Grace Kelly and Jimmy Stewart look out the window, "I'm not much on rear window ethics."
The blatant voyeurism in Rear Window is the perfect metaphor for what it is to go to the movies. Hitchcock's hero, Jimmy Stewart, plays L. B. "Jeff" Jeffries, a photographer who specializes in far-flung travel and exciting assignments — the more remote and dangerous the better. But after deciding to shoot a high-speed auto race from within the track (and being hit by a race car and sidelined with a broken leg), the itinerant photographer is stuck, going stir crazy in his New York City one-bedroom apartment, during a long hot summer with nothing to do. He begins passing his time by spying on his neighbors for entertainment, through the zoom lens on his camera.
His visiting nurse Stella, played by Thelma Ritter, tells Jeff, "We've become a race of Peeping Toms." She is initially bothered by Jeff's curiosity, but luckily for the audience her own desire to know what's happening across Jeff's courtyard matches ours. She joins Jeff in watching the neighbors and even gives them nicknames, like "Miss Torso" and "Miss Lonelyhearts". Tuned in regularly to everyone's daily routines, Jeff begins to notice that one of the couples, a middle-aged husband and his bedridden wife, may be acting in a peculiar manner. "I've seen bickering and family quarrels and mysterious trips at night, and knives and saws and ropes, and now since last evening, not a sign of the wife. How do you explain that?"
Miss Lonelyhearts is an unhappy single woman who Jeff watches go on unsuccessful dates
Miss Torso
Stella and Jeff's girlfriend, Lisa Fremont, played to the hilt of 1950s allure by Grace Kelly, at first try to persuade Jeff that he is imagining things, but they can't help looking and getting caught up in all of the rear window dramas. It's all fun for Jeff, Lisa and Stella to play a guessing game of unraveling the mysteries of their neighbor's lives — until they realize that they have stumbled upon a murder, and then the game becomes deadly serious.
Middle-aged couple with dog they treat like a child
Middle-aged couple without dog or child - the Thorwalds
Hitchcock captures the close quarters that come with city living - the proximity, the curiosity, and the assumptions we make about our neighbors - the feeling that we "know" people that we have never spoken to simply because we see them every day. He created the entire apartment complex in a single set, complete with action on the street beyond Jeff's camera's line of sight. It's an amazing achievement. As he told François Truffaut, "It was a possibility of doing a purely cinematic film. You have an immobilized man looking out. That's one part of the film. The second part shows what he sees and the third part shows how he reacts. This is actually the purest expression of a cinematic idea."
Jeff's summer is spent sweltering while he watches his neighbors in the heat and intimacy of their lives. Lisa gently presses him to heat up their own relationship, while he continues to push her away, afraid of commitment and losing his life of adventure. In Jeff's eyes Lisa and he are completely mis-matched. Anyone looking out their rear window and in at them would see that she is perfect for him. Stewart and Kelly have wonderful chemistry.
The Composer (with Hitchcock making his cameo, winding a clock)
The Sculptor
The movie could be viewed as simply a suspense thriller with a romantic subplot and it would still be top-notch. But I see Rear Window as an elaborate mating ritual between Lisa and Jeff, with the emphasis on their romance and Jeff's fears about their future. I think Hitchcock is most interested in the interplay between all the couples, with the thriller plot a perfect structure to tell their stories of loneliness and search for love. Jeff is not only watching his neighbors from his window but trying on each of their identities as a possible outcome with Lisa.
"Miss Torso" and "Miss Lonelyhearts" are two extremes of the lives led by single women. A male songwriter and a female sculptor are each channeling their romantic energies into their art. There are three couples - the young sex-crazed newlyweds; a couple, not far from the age of Jeff and Lisa, but whose lives are distinctly less glamorous, with a dog they treat as their baby; and Lars Thorwald (Raymond Burr) and his nagging, bedridden wife - the couple no one would want to become but Jeff fears he and Lisa might.
The Newlyweds
As Jeff tries to decide which of these scenarios best fit his romance with Lisa, she decides to toss out all of Jeff's potential relationship stereotypes, and goes into action. She enters his view by leaving the apartment and their theorizing behind and crossing the courtyard to actually investigate. "Why would Thorwald want to kill a little dog? Because it knew too much?" She proves herself as adventurous and risk-taking (if not more so) than Jeff, by sneaking into Thorwald's apartment and stealing Mrs. Thorwald's wedding ring, helping to prove Jeff's theories about the woman's murder and symbolically securing a ring for herself and Jeff.
Jeff becomes so wrapped up in watching the drama being played out, so excited by her audacity, that even when Lisa puts herself in an extremely dangerous situation, he can't keep himself from looking. And neither can we. The only thing that finally breaks his view out the window is when Thorwald himself comes over for a visit ...
Rear Window is just as thrilling to watch today as it must have been when it was initially released in 1954. Hitchcock uses the murder mystery format to tell deeper stories about loneliness, city life, fears of intimacy, and the good and bad places where love might lead. No matter what your views are on "rear window ethics" as Lisa refers to them, the viewer will be immensely grateful that Alfred Hitchcock created this glimpse into others' lives, before the neighbors got wise and pulled the curtains.
François Truffaut, Alfred Hitchcock, Helen G. Scott, "Hitchcock", Google Books
