by Allan Fish
(USA 1954 112m) DVD1/2
Preview of coming attractions
p Alfred Hitchcock d Alfred Hitchcock w John Michael Hayes story “It Had to be Murder” by Cornell Woolrich ph Robert Burks ed George Tomasini m Franz Waxman art Hal Pereira, Joseph MacMillan Johnson cos Edith Head
James Stewart (L.B.Jeffries), Grace Kelly (Lisa Carol Fremont), Thelma Ritter (Stella), Wendell Corey (Det.Thomas J.Doyle), Raymond Burr (Lars Thorwald), Judith Evelyn (Miss Lonely Hearts),
Rear Window is a film that splits opinion to this day, and was also a film it took me some time to appreciate. For sure it was always easy to admire the technical virtuosity of the piece, but it was the emotions that took a while to show through. Rather like the later Vertigo, it grows on you. It also contains what is Hitchcock’s most singularly relevant cameo appearance; he’s glimpsed early on setting the time on a clock in an apartment opposite, which could not be more appropriate. He has time in his hands and James Stewart’s L.B.Jeffries has too much time on his hands.
L.B.Jeffries is an action photographer who has broken his leg and is laid up in his apartment for the seventh straight week. His only company are the daily visits of his nurse, Stella, and his rich society girlfriend, fashion expert Lisa Fremont. They warn him about his spending too much time spying out of his window with binoculars and a long focus lens (“you get to looking out the window, seeing things you shouldn’t see; TROUBLE!” says Ritter at one point), but he continues doing so. However, when he begins to believe that one of his neighbours has killed his harridan of a wife, he gets himself and his cohorts in deadly trouble.
Hitch is one of the cinema’s great voyeurs and this is the ultimate expression of that voyeurism. Human beings have an inherent desire to poke their nose in things that don’t concern them, as witness the millions of copies sold by tabloid newspapers, gossip and celebrity magazines. Add to this a photographer’s eye for tiny details and you have a potentially dangerous cocktail. It’s in the end no surprise that Stewart ends up with a matching set of plaster casts on his leg, for it’s all he deserves. He may have solved a murder, but in some ways Burr’s Thorwald is more sympathetic. A pathetic embryonic Laird Cregar of a character with awful silver hair driven to murder by his wife from hell. Certainly Kelly’s society gal, though hotter than a blast furnace at maximum, plays the sort of character it’s easy to be irritated by. I mean, who else orders out at the Twenty One Club and sports $1,100 dresses? Don’t you just hate her, girls? As for Stewart, he’s no less unsympathetic. His treatment of Kelly is at times bordering on the sadistic, his disregard for privacy sometimes nauseating (he may solve a murder, but he spies on everyone else, too) and it’s not too difficult to see him as the representation of Hitchcock himself and the first of the morally ambiguous heroes Stewart played for Hitch (his earlier lead in Rope being a proper good guy). Hitch saw a faint menace in Stewart that so few saw and he developed that darkness still further in Vertigo. Stewart for his part is quite superb and Kelly, too, was never better. As for Ritter, she steals every scene she’s in as the straight-talking Stella who always looks on the morbid side.
And yet, though credit must also go to John Hayes for his witty, complex script, Robert Burks for his memorable cinematography (especially on such a set), Head for her gorgeous use of Grace Kelly’s languid clothes horse, Pereira for his massive set, Waxman for his unobtrusive score and for the use of melodies and songs that are used on the soundtrack (gotta love Bing Crosby crooning ‘To see you is to love you’), most praise must go to Hitch himself. Rear Window really is a piece of incredible cinematic genius, a film of startling complexity and dramatic bravado. Much may have been said about the cruelty on display, and it is full of cruelty (not least in Burr’s murder of the poor dog in the basket), but it only acknowledges our own dark side. It may not quite be as psychologically challenging as Vertigo, but I’ll be damned if it isn’t still one of his finest achievements.
A Hitchcock masterpiece.
Nuff said!
Hi! Allan Fish,
What a very masterful review too!….I really like to watch this Hitchcock masterpiece again and again and…. As a matter of fact, I watched this film last week for what seems like the “upteenth” time!….and to me it always seems “fresh”(For lack of a better word…)
I think your last paragraph “sums” up this film completely. Therefore, it doesn’t make a lot of sense for me to copy and paste what you already said, again in my comment box because once is enough.
Thank-you!
Dcd
Sam Juliano,
You took the two words right of “me” mouth…“methink.”
DeeDee
Oops! Sam Juliano, make that…“methinks”…
…Allan Fish said,”Rear Window is a film that splits opinion to this day, (I agree with you, Allan, this film still is the cause of many different opinions and so, is the man who(m) directed this film…”Hitch”) and was also a film it took me some time to appreciate. ”
(I’am so “happy” to say, it was “love” at first viewing for me Allan.) Btw, I most definitely, would be “remissed” if I didn’t mention the fact, that this is T.S., favorite film, Hitchcock is his favorite director (Well, I’am not quite sure if Hitchcock is his favorite director, but I know for a fact, that actor James (“Jimmy”) Stewart, is one of his favorite actor.)
Thank-you!
Dcd
The aspect of Rear Window that left the strongest impression on me during my most recent viewing was its fierce, almost frightening commentary on the act of watching film. Thorwald’s final confrontation of Jeffries in the latter man’s apartment struck me as exceedingly terrifying because the film seems to suddenly break the fourth wall and lurch into meta-territory. Thorwald’s interrogation of a silent Jeffries–his face cloaked in black shadow–could be the questions of any film villain who suddenly becomes aware of the presence of a faceless audience out there in the dark. I never realized how frightening that scene can be if it’s approached, not as the climax of a suspense film with Jeffries as the hero, but *Thorwald’s* existential “Confrontation in the Cave” with *us*, the viewer.
Wonderful contributions from you again Dee Dee! And I love your own revelations as to your long association with Hitch and with this film. T. S. of Screen Savour is indeed a huge fan of this film, it is his favorite Hitchcock as you contend.
Andrew, you always bring astute and scholarly observation to the table and I thank you so much for your insightful acknowledgement that what strikes you most profoundly with REAR WINDOW is it’s “fierce, almost frightening commentary on the act of watching film.”
Indeed. Brilliant stuff.
The complexity of the screenplay is legendary as is Jimmy Stewart’s performance. I voted it among my own Top 5 of the decade, and it may be Hitch’s most brilliant film. Fine review by Allan Fish.
Interesting, I actually loved Vertigo on first viewing – was blown away in fact, largely because I had no idea what was going to happen next.
Rear Window, while I certainly admired it, was somewhat disappointing to me because I found it predictable. Of course, it’s grown on me since.
Allan, I’m not so sure about the statement that this is a film that divides viewers. Just about everyone I know loves Hitccock’s films from the 50′s, and this seems to be the predominant favorite! Everything, else in the review is spot-on; you sure nailed all the essentials of this one with characteristic succinctness. I might add, though, that since Stewart is an international news photographer, he is in a sense a professional snoop. And considering that he spends the whole movie in a wheelchair, he does wonders with a role based on immobility. Not many other actors could have done so much with this role that you actually forget that he barely moves for the entire movie. Isn’t Ritter fabulous? How did she fail to get an Oscar nomination for this part? And Kelly never looked lovelier or behaved so appealingly.
I had the good fortune to see both “North by Northwest” and this one on the big screen the first time I saw them. I immediately loved “N by NW,” but this one took a while to grow on me. It’s now my third favorite Hitchcock film (“N by NW is #1, “Vertigo,” which also took a while to grow on me is #2–but they’re all up there on my all-time favorites list). I’m willing to bet “Vertigo” will also appear on your list–it’s Hitch’s most complex and challenging film, rapturous in its effect in a way that the sheerly entertaining “N by NW” and “Rear Window” aren’t. I’m expecting it to appear somewhere in the top 5.
At The Movie Projector I wrote a whole post about Ritter and discussed her role in this film. I also wrote a post about Stewart and discussed how Hitch used him in this film, “Vertigo,” and “Rope” to bring out a certain side of his screen persona. Hope some of your readers will find time to check them out.
Another superlative comment by R.D. Finch!
Well, R.D., I won’t bet against your prediction as to VERTIGO placing in Allan’s Top Five! Allan keeps his comment responses short and sweet, but I know of his affinity for this film. One of the site’s dearest contributors and friends, the incoparable Dee Dee (nee ‘Dark City Dame’) thinks the film is the greatest ever, and she spent a month at her Noirish City bringing in film scholars, bloggers and authors to enrich the VERTIGO experience.
Of course, Sight and Sound now considers this one of the greatest films of all-time, no surprise.
I also had it on my own Top 5 list in the presently-running 50′s poll.
But R.D. is quite right when he says that critics are not at all split on REAR WINDOW. There really isn’t one who doesn’t consider it a supreme masterpiece, and it’s true, R.D., that many have it as their own #1.
Interesting that you saw this and NORTH BY NORTHWEST in a theatre FIRST. I saw PSYCHO and THE BIRDS in a theatre first, but not these three. Great stuff!
I will definitely be checking out your post on Ritter, R.D.!
As an interesting bit of trivia…Stewart’s and Kelly’s characters were inspired by the real-life romance between famed war photographer Robert Kapa and Hitch’s previous muse-de-jour Ingrid Bergman — there’s so many subtexts to explore through this Window…in my opinion, Hitch’s best from the decade…and well, my pick for best film overall from the decade.
It certainly vies with “Vertigo” as one of the two greatest Hitchcocks of them all.
I won’t and don’t choose 1 masterpiece above the others, but for me it ranks with Hitch’s finest, top flight pantheon which in my opinion are….
The 39 Steps
Rebecca
Notorious
Rear Window
Vertigo
North by Northwest
Psycho
by the way, Raymond Burr’s Lars Thorwald appearance was based on Hitch’s old boss, David O. Selznick!!!
Bobby, I was aware of that Burr anecdote, but it is much welcome and appreciated here.
And who could argue with that above list which includes all my own top-rank choices with the possible exception of two others that could rightfully join the ones you rightly mention:
The Lady Vanishes
Strangers on a Train
And sometimes I weaken with:
I Confess
Of course the great Robin Wood has always been huge on:
The Birds
(don’t know if I’d go that far)
Thanks again Bobby!
Mind you Sam, I’ma big fan of the Birds too…
But I’ve always admired the technical and psychological aspects of Marnie, a much derided Hitch film.
Those above are my four Star choices. Strangers on a Train, The Lady Vanishes (which i must watch again for a revaluation), Shadow of a Doubt, Spellbound, the British version of The Man who knew too much, and several others would be mt 2nd tier choices for 3 stars.
Bobby that’s more that fair enough.
SPELLBOUND, the British MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH, and SHADOW OF A DOUBT would all be strong second tier with me.
Bobby, did you know that Allan thinks the Jimmy Stewart THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH is maybe the worst or one of the absolute worst of all the Hitchcocks.
LOL!!!! We have had some heated exchanges over that. It’s nowhere near the original by it’s still a reasonable decent film, methinks.
What do you think if I might ask?
Since this thread has been suddenly revived and since I love Hitchcock, I contribute my own list of Hitch’s top 10 (a list of personal favorites–strictly subjective):
1. North by Northwest
2. Vertigo
3. Rear Window
4. Strangers on a Train
5. Psycho
6. Foreign Correspondent
7. The Lady Vanishes
8. The 39 Steps
9. Rebecca
10. tie: Notorious and The Birds
Most underrated: The Wrong Man
Most overrated: Spellbound and Shadow of a Doubt
Most ripe for rediscovery: Young and Innocent (I wrote a post on this at The Movie Projector)
As for The Man Who Knew Too Much, I used to prefer the original, but after seeing both versions again in the last year or so, I’ve changed my mind. Nothing in the remake equals the dentist (with Hitch’s cruel sense of humor and exploitation of everybody’s dread of dental pain) or the cult scenes in the original, but as a whole I think I prefer the remake. Somehow making the leads a dentist from Indiana and his wholesome, vapid wife creates more tension for me than having them jet-setting sharpshooters. And Stewart’s star power contributes greatly.
OK…
*****
THE 39 STEPS, THE LADY VANISHES, REBECCA, NOTORIOUS, REAR WINDOW, VERTIGO, NORTH BY NORTHWEST, PSYCHO
****½
THE LODGER, BLACKMAIL (SILENT VERSION), FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT, SHADOW OF A DOUBT, STRANGERS ON A TRAIN
****
THE MANXMAN, THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH, SABOTAGE, SPELLBOUND, THE WRONG MAN, THE BIRDS, MARNIE
Most underrated film – THE MANXMAN
And R.D, don’t you start giving a tie for last place, that’s Sam’s copyrighted method of cheating.
I erroneously left out PSYCHO earlier in my discussion with Bobby J…….grievous oversight caused by quick thinking. PSYCHO is one of his greatest films.
Ha R.D.!
You can give all the ties you want! Don’t listen to Allan!
Ok, I’ll “officially” play the Top Ten Hitchcock game:
1. Vertigo
2. Psycho
3. Rebecca
4. The Lady Vanishes
5. Rear Window
6. Notorious
7. Strangers on a Train
8. I Confess
9. North by Northwest
10. The 39 Steps
Most Underated: I Confess
Runners Ups: The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934)
Blackmail (silent)
Shadow of a Doubt
The Birds
Manxman
The Wrong Man
R.D. I greatly enjoyed your comparison of the two versions of THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH. You really make an excellent point about Hitch’s attentiveness to the “dental pain” in the original, but I agree the remake is MUCH better than some will believe.
Interesting thread gentlemen, and a heated debate at that. But whereas I would rather look at Hitchcock’s best work broken down into two correct periods (his early black and white years and his later work in color through Paramount Pictures), if you need a list and a gun needs to be put to my head, then a list you shall get…..
from No 10 up to No 1
10. The Man Who Knew too Much (orig.)
(starts the ball rolling with Hitch, and the suspense form is truly born)
9. The 39 Steps
(perfecting the form little by little)
8. Psycho
(doing more with less)
7. The Lady Vanishes
6. Rear Window
5. Rebecca
(Proof that a literal adapatation can maintain suspense)
4. North by Northwest
(as perfect an entertainment as ever produced by Hollywood, James Bond is truly born here)
3. Shadow of a Doubt
2. Notorious
1. Vertigo
In my book, Rear Window qualifies as a great film for many, many reasons. But one of my favorite things about it, as well as Vertigo, is that it’s a film that can be appreciated and loved by pretty much anyone on a purely entertaining, dinner-and-a-movie kind of way, while simultaneously containing layers of subtleties and masterful choices by Hitchcock, his team and actors to tantalize the cinephiles. I love movies that do that, that can be smart and sophisticated without becoming obtuse, while remaining accessible and never letting their structural brilliance trip up the storytelling. There are quite a few films like that on these 1950s lists everyone is submitting. Rear Window is in my opinion, a stunning example of that fusion of artistry and entertainment.
In an aside, the first time I saw this film was on t.v., but the second time was from a rear window. My dormitory in college had a night time, outdoor showing of it via many coeds’ white sheets pinned together and hung from the third floor windows on one side of our courtyard to make a theatrical sized screen. Once it got dark enough, they started the show. Most people watched from picnic blankets on the ground, but my dorm room was directly opposite the screen. I sat by my window like L.B. Jeffries and watched the whole thing (quite literally, when you include the set-up of the screen) unfold. The sound was not optimal, but it is still a terrific memory. I have seen it several times since with much better technical exhibition factors, but my rear window Rear Window viewing remains by far my favorite.
Jenny: That is a marvelous account about when and where you saw REAR WINDOW for the first time from that “rear window” of the dorm!! That experience is truly incomparable as far as I am concerned, and you report it beautifully! And yes, you was a kind of L.B. Jeffries indeed!
I agree this is a masterpiece that improves with every viewing, and I think you nail it here:
“Rear Window is in my opinion, a stunning example of that fusion of artistry and entertainment.”
Definitive comment here. We are lucky to have it!
Hi! Sam Juliano and WitD readers,
Please! ….let me list my top Hitchcock films….
1. The Lady Vanishes
2.The 39 Steps
3. To Catch a Thief
4. Rear Window
5.Rebecca
6.Vertigo
7.Notorious
8.North by Northwest
9.Strangers on a Train
10.Mr. and Mrs. Smith…As far as I’am concerned the only thing that the remake of this film have in common with Alfred Hitchcock’s Mr.and Mrs. Smith, is the “title” and a man and woman are in the lead roles.
11. Paradine Case
12. The Lodger
13. The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934)
14. The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956)
15. Psycho
16. Dial M for Murder
17. The Birds
18.Foreign Correspondent
19.Shadow of a Doubt
20. I feel Hitch’s (noirish) “The Wrong Man” is his most “underated” film.My least favorite Hitchcock film… most definitely,….”Under Capricorn.” (I must admit that this film does have a “cult” following among some Hitchcock “fanatics.”)
These (Hitchcock) films are most definitely, not in my order of preference.
Tks,
Deedee