Solid if overrated Hitch picture (Rear Window [1954] (DVD))

Member Name: shaneo632

Product:	Rear Window [1954] (DVD)
Date:	11/09/09 (1 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Premise and tension

Disadvantages: Not his best

note: also appears in part on Flixster and The Student Room

Rear Window is a classic film from Alfred Hitchcock that stands alongside Psycho and Vertigo. The film opens with our protagonist, L. B. Jeffries (James Stewart), a photographer, who has recently had an accident which leaves him in his apartment all day, looking out of his apartment window with a pair of binoculars. The film depicts him as a voyeur - not only does he watch attractive women getting changed, though, as many men would do, but he is taken by the acts of the neighbours across the road. This becomes something of an obsession as he believes that perhaps someone has been murdered by a man named Thorwald. Meanwhile, his fiance Lisa (Grace Kelly), finds herself disconnecting from him as the voyeur inside him takes over.

As with Vertigo, this is a film about dark obsession, with a protagonist who is seemingly affable on the outside, but becomes dragged into a dark world where he may simply be dellusional, or there may be a more dark and disturbing nature to the suspicious sights across the road. We travel with Jeffries every step of the way - when he peeks through his binoculars, we also see this, heightening our identification with him as a voyeur, and in this regard the film has been seen as an allegory of the cinematic experience itself, where we are watching for pleasure but may find other hidden facets that we wouldn't expect.

An entertaining film, but flawed, and Hitchcock's most overrated work. Its pace plods at times, but the final scenes are very tense, and the script is generally very sharp. Rope, Psycho, and North by Northwest are all considerably better than this, but it's undeniably a classic and well acted.

Summary: Overrated but still good