Rear Window (1954)
Rear Window (1954), directed by Alfred Hitchcock.
quote
New York State sentence for a Peeping Tom is six months in the workhouse. And they got no windows in the workhouse. You know, in the old days they used to put out your eyes with a red-hot poker.
-- Stella
Some familiar bits of life rarely make it into the movies. Did you ever sit on a porch or next to an open window all night long and just listen to the neighborhood as the hours pass? We get that in Rear Window. It's the night of the murder, but set that aside.
Just as I don't feel obligated to keep top-10 or "best" or "worst" lists, I don't have to have a favorite Hitchcock picture. Vertigo (1958) is spookier and more intricate, but Rear Window is endlessly rewatchable Fun. I never stop marveling over its meticulous construction and rich layers.
We know that all the characters of the courtyard are in some way alternates for Jeff and Lisa, particularly Miss Lonelyhearts and Miss Torso, the Songwriter, the Newlyweds and the Thorwalds. We also understand that:
Jeff = voyeur = director = movie watcher
window = movie screen = theater of the mind in the viewer's head
That last part has intriguing implications. We don't mind believing that books and movies play out in our psyches with all their subconscious symbols and influences, but what about substantial Reality? Doesn't the same mechanism project and process the real world on that interior screen? I suppose everyone has been involved in arguments where "what you heard" was not "what I said". It might be the same for all our sensory experiences.
Miscellaneous notes after a first viewing of the Blu-ray:
Watch the street background and the reflections in open windows. Just an extra bit of life.
Note which courtyard window is behind our main characters in every shot. Nothing is framed without purpose.
We see Hitchcock's love of silent film, but the sound design is also carefully crafted. Sometimes it introduces or accompanies the visual scene, but is sometimes ironic contrast.
I always forget: all those vivid blue eyes.
We'll never know the name of that place across the street. Is it a diner or just a bar? The right part of the sign is "B[?]-A-R".
I never noticed before: during the very first pan of the courtyard, there is a photo-flash in a top floor apartment, above the couple with the dog in the basket. Is this where the two sunbathers live? Do we see them more than once? (On the Blu-ray the flash is at 2:20).
Jeff seems unreasonably sour towards Lisa, who is passionately devoted to him. Stewart was 46 and Kelley 25, although it seems she really did like older men.
The joke is on Jeff, though. With Lisa and Stella ganging up on him, he doesn't have a chance. His fantasy of being an independent man of action: ha!
Lisa is very proper but within those standards she is sexually aggressive. Since Jeff is rendered harmless by his cast she can safely stay overnight and taunt him with lingerie and heavy kissing.
Jeff is more interested in the little stories of the courtyard, particularly the murder. To get his attention Lisa has to enter that story so he can spy on her with his "portable keyhole". It works: he really warms up to her when she becomes a sleuth. This is a common pattern: women are more willing to enter men's fantasies than the reverse.
Cleverness: while Jeff sleeps we see a mystery woman leaving with Thorwald. Maybe it's the wife and Jeff is wrong. Flip that later when we know the killer is coming for him before he does.
The courtyard is pretty shabby. Only the killer tries to fix it up with his flowers. I wouldn't count Miss Hearing Aid's sculptures.
The Dog Who Knew Too Much.
I never noticed before: the Songwriter is unhappy and out of place at his own party.
Hitchcock was unconcerned with plausibility and neither are we the first time through. That a body could be dismembered and carted out piece by piece without leaving a blood trail? That the killer could bury his wife's head in the garden (and why would he?), dig it up again and kill the dog all without being observed -- especially by Jeff?
I never noticed before: Miss Lonelyhearts has a Bible after she lays out the pills.
Lisa and the cat walk the same path up the steps. She is a poised, graceful cat burglar. Sexual metaphor, of course.
When Thorwald sees the ring on Lisa's finger and looks right at Jeff -- and us -- we jump guiltily, as if being caught looking were the crime. Well, and also because we figure that Jeff is next.
Thelma Ritter Fan Club!
The movie and the Songwriter's composition -- "Lisa" -- develop in parallel and are completed at the same time.
Franz Waxman score, Edith Head costumes.
Available on Blu-ray with a light but informative commentary track, mostly on the visual and sound design.
