Rear Window (1954)

In Alfred Hitchcock's superb nail-biting thriller about a mostly confined incapacitated photographer with a broken leg in his apartment, he kept occupied by his rear window view into other apartments across the building's courtyard - it was an intriguing, brilliant, macabre visual study of obsessive human curiosity and voyeurism. Remarkably, the camera angles were largely from the protagonist's own apartment, so the film viewer (in a dark theatre) saw the inhabitants of the other apartments almost entirely from his point of view - to share in his voyeuristic surveillance.

The glowingly-beautiful Grace Kelly won the Best Actress Oscar in the same year for her deglamourized role in The Country Girl (1954). This was her second of three films for Hitchcock (she had already made Dial M for Murder (1954) and would next star in To Catch a Thief (1955)), before leaving acting in 1956 to marry Prince Rainier of Monaco.

Hitchcock's masterpiece received only four Academy Award nominations (with no Oscars): Best Director, Best Screenplay (John Michael Hayes), Best Color Cinematography (Robert Burks), and Best Sound Recording. John Michael Hayes' screenplay was based on Cornell Woolrich's (with pen-name William Irish) original 1942 short story or novelette, It Had to Be Murder.

• in the opening voyeuristic sequence of efficient visual story-telling, the camera tracked out through the framed windows of a Greenwich Village apartment (surrounded by other Lower East Side apartment structures), and introduced the setting and entire complex - a lower courtyard and garden; tracking back into the open apartment window, the apartment's occupant was asleep, sweating profusely - it was 94 degrees on the thermometer - during a heat wave

Neighbors Within Jeff's View in His Greenwich Village Apartment Complex
Songwriter/Composer (Ross Bagdasarian) Shaving	"Miss Torso" (Georgine Darcy) Doing Exercises	Lars Thorwald (Raymond Burr) Arguing With Sick Wife Anna in Bedroom

• the opening camera tracking was followed by a long panning camera movement to view the lives of some of the apartment neighbors, including a composer/songwriter (Ross Bagdasarian) shaving (and later playing the piano), an older dog-loving couple (Sara Berner and Frank Cady) sleeping on an outside fire escape to avoid the heat, and a blonde exerciser known as "Miss Torso" (Georgine Darcy) doing exercises and chores at the same time; the panning shot also included a tour of the 2nd floor apartment of the protagonist - a man immobilized in a wheelchair, who was identified L.B. "Jeff" Jefferies (James Stewart); his left leg was in a cast - inscribed: "Here lie the broken bones of L. B. Jefferies"; clues in the apartment (photos and camera equipment) hinted at his dangerous occupation; seven weeks earlier, he sustained his fractured-leg injury in a crash while he was photographing a car race from the middle of the track to get a "dramatic" photo; it was suggested that his blonde fashion-model girlfriend was shown on the cover of a large stack of LIFE Magazines, labeled "Paris Fashions"
• Jeff also observed one grouchy neighbor in the opposite apartment, later identified as Lars Thorwald (Raymond Burr), who returned home from work (framed in one window) and argued with his blonde-haired, nagging, sick, negligee-clad wife Anna Thorwald (Irene Winston) who was lying in bed
• later, Jeff was visited by his sharp-tongued nurse-therapist and masseuse Stella McCaffery (Thelma Ritter) from the insurance company, who disapproved of his spying on neighbors and denounced the practice: "Oh dear, we've become a race of Peeping Toms. What people oughta do is get outside their own house and look in for a change. Yes, sir. How's that for a bit of home-spun philosophy?"; the confined Jeff's "peeping tom" static camera point-of-view was from his Greenwich Village apartment's rear window where he was stuck in his wheelchair
• Stella also cautioned Jeff about his lack of roots and commitment, his sidestepping of marriage and his lukewarm attitude toward Lisa Carol Fremont (Grace Kelly), his fashion-model girlfriend; he explained how she was too different from him, as a "Park Avenue" woman - too rich, "too perfect," spoiled, sophisticated and incompatible for his lifestyle
• just before Stella left, Jeff saw a newlywed couple move in - the Newlyweds (Havis Davenport and Rand Harper), who kissed and closed their blinds
• as the stationary Jeff dozed off at sunset, his high-fashion model and girlfriend Lisa glamorously appeared in front of him - she was a stylish vision of beauty - elegant, lovely, affluent, and blonde; she bent over, and then lovingly kissed him, roused and awakened him from his sleep; she suggestively whispered a number of questions to him: " Lisa: "How's your leg?" Jeff: "It hurts a little." Lisa: "And your stomach?" Jeff: "Empty as a football." (She kissed him again) Lisa: "And your love life?" Jeff: "Not too active." Lisa: (smiling) "Anything else bothering you?" Jeff: "Mm-hmm. Who are you?"; as she flicked on the apartment's lights one-by-one, she told him her name, disjointedly: "Lisa - Carol - Fremont."

Jeff's Girlfriend - Glamorous Model Lisa Fremont (Grace Kelly)

• she also introduced herself to him by performing and posing in front of him while glamorously dressed in a new, fashionable, and expensive $1,100 haute-couture Parisian gown; they shared a catered lobster dinner and chilled wine in an ice bucket delivered by a uniformed, red-coated waiter from the Twenty-One Club, to celebrate the last week of Jeff's imprisonment in a cast; she promised Jeff: "I'm going to make this a week you'll never forget," but he essentially rejected her efforts to get him established in the New York fashion photography industry

Jeff Observing Spinster "Miss Lonelyhearts" (Judith Evelyn)

• while experiencing some romantic tensions together, Jeff watched across the way as a lonely, middle-aged spinster (Judith Evelyn), dubbed 'Miss Lonelyhearts,' set a table for two, put a bottle of wine on the table and lit the candles, while fantasizing through pantomiming with a gentleman caller who had arrived to be with her; Jeff was also distracted by watching "Miss Torso" juggling three suitors, while Thorwald served his wife dinner and then was caught having a clandestine conversation on the phone with another lover; director Hitchcock's cameo took place in the songwriter's apartment as he fixed a clock; Jeff and Lisa continued to have their own strained relationship, since Jeff was unwilling to commit to her and thus compromise his own career; they argued and appeared on the verge of breaking up for good before she left him to go home for the night
• later that evening - a stormy night, there was a suspicious female scream and the sound of breaking glass; he watched the mysterious and suspicious comings and goings on the part of his across-the-courtyard neighbor Lars Thorwald, who was making repeated late-night trips carrying a heavy and then emptied suitcase; early the next morning while Jeff slept, Thorwald left his apartment with an unidentified middle-aged woman dressed in black; when Stella arrived, Jeff told her about Thorwald's strange behavior, and speculated Thorwald was taking something out of the apartment - an alleged murder theory; he offered Stella more morbid theories and observations about Thorwald's suspicious activities
• as they both stared over at Thorwald's apartment, with the shades up, Thorwald glanced back - and he cautioned Stella to get out of the line of sight: "That's no ordinary look. That's the kind of a look a man gives when he's afraid somebody might be watching him"; Thorwald was actually watching the fire-escape couple's little dog sniffing around the rose bushes in the flower bed of his garden

The Next Morning: Views From Jeff's Apartment Rear Window
Jeff's Comment to Stella: "That's no ordinary look"	The Couple's Little Dog Sniffing Around Flower Bed in Thorwald's Garden
Thorwald Replacing Items in His Sample Case	Thorwald Wrapping Up a Saw Blade and Butcher Knife in His Kitchen

• as Stella was leaving, Jeff asked for her to reach for his binoculars, and she warned: "Trouble, I can smell it"; not satisfied, he grabbed his huge, high-powered telephoto lens - not to take pictures but to use them as long-range binoculars; as Jeff viewed the salesman replacing items in his sample case, wrapping a saw blade and a butcher knife in newspaper in his kitchen, and also noticed that Thorwald's wife was missing from the apartment
• later that evening, Jeff and a very provocative Lisa passionately hugged and kissed in his apartment, as she asked: "How far does a girl have to go before you notice her?...Pay attention to me"; she was mostly being romantically ignored and overlooked as Jeff became more and more obsessed about discussing his neighbor's nocturnal activities; when he mentioned how difficult it would be to cut up a human body, Lisa became critical that he had become an obsessed Peeping Tom, as Stella had earlier warned: ("You're beginning to scare me a little")
• Jeff watched as Thorwald carried a heavy rope and walked into his wife's shaded bedroom, and looked like he was picking up something very heavy; they both watched as Thorwald tied up a very large wooden crate with a rope in front of a rolled-up mattress in his wife's bedroom, and then sat by himself in the living room in the dark; Lisa began to conclude that Jeff's insane, sinister, and imaginative conclusions might be accurate: ("Let's start from the beginning again, Jeff. Tell me everything you saw and what you think it means"); later in the night, to provide Jeff with "legs," Lisa (on her way home) went to Thorwald's mailbox and read off his name and address to Jeff by phone; at the same time, Thorwald was smoking a cigarette by himself in his living room in the dark

Thorwald Returning and Carrying a Long Rope

Thorwald Putting a Rope Around a Wooden Crate in His Wife's Bedroom

Lisa - Now Convinced That Jeff's Theories Might be True

• the next morning, as Stella served breakfast to Jeff, she hypothesized that Thorwald had cut up the body in the bathtub to wash away the blood; Jeff's continuing obsession with his neighbor was further strengthened when he watched two parcel-post delivery men arrive at Thorwald's apartment to pick up the wooden crate
• during a visit by Jeff's NYC plain-clothes police detective friend Lt. Tom Doyle (Wendell Corey), he attempted to dissuade Jeff from his exaggerated observations and argued that he had misinterpreted evidence of a murder - " This is a thousand to one shot," and that there must be "a very simple explanation" for everything, but then promised to "poke around" a little; later in the day, Tom reported back in person to Jeff that witnesses saw Thorwald leave the apartment with his wife the previous morning at about 6 am (while Jeff was sleeping) to go to the railroad station; Tom also refused to issue a search warrant without more substantial evidence, and produced one further finding - a postcard was found in Thorwald's mailbox from his wife in nearby Meritsville about her safe arrival
• that evening, Jeff noticed that Thorwald arrived home, took shirts out of a laundry box and began packing a suitcase as if he was leaving permanently; he also rummaged through his wife's alligator handbag, and handled her jewelry and pearl necklace, including a gold-banded (wedding?) ring
• Lisa arrived (prepared to stay for the weekend with one small handbag-sized black "suitcase" filled with frilly, pink, overnight lingerie and slippers) and appeared convinced of Thorwald's guilt; she questioned why Mrs. Thorwald would unpredictably leave behind her "favorite handbag" (with jewelry); she also speculated that Thorwald was involved in an adulterous relationship with a female accomplice in the murder of his wife; however, their suspicions were debunked when Tom arrived and confirmed that everything checked out: Thorwald's trunk was intercepted with no evidence of foul play, and it was delivered to Mrs. Thorwald in Meritsville; he speculated there was a "family problem" and she wasn't planning on coming back
• both Jeff and Lisa began to thoughtfully feel that their meddling into the lives of his neighbors was unethical and improper snooping that it had been proven unfruitful: (Lisa: "I'm not much on rear-window ethics....You'd think we could be a little bit happier that the poor woman is alive and well....The show's over for tonight" - and she prepared to have an intimate evening with Jeff by lowering the blinds and putting on her pink silk nightgown

Thorwald Looking at Wife's Gold Wedding Ring From Her Purse	Lisa Intrigued - and Questioning Why a Wife Would Leave Behind Her Handbag
Couple's Discovery of Their Strangled Dog in Courtyard: ("Which one of you did it? Which one of you killed my dog?")	Jeff to Lisa: "In the whole courtyard, only one person didn't come to the window"

• suddenly, there was a scream from the female dog owner on the outer fire escape - the upstairs older couple's little dog (that was earlier seen digging in the garden) was found dead in the courtyard from strangulation; the dead dog laid on the concrete in front of Thorwald's garden - maliciously killed with its neck broken; the female dog owner asked: ("Which one of you did it? Which one of you killed my dog?"); Jeff noticed that the only person in the courtyard who didn't emerge from inside when the dog was discovered was Thorwald, seen smoking a glowing cigarette in his darkened apartment
• the next day, Jeff's nurse Stella and Lisa (in a flower-print dress) watched out Jeff's rear window as Thorwald was seen scrubbing the walls of the bathroom above the tub in his apartment - possibly confirming that he had murdered his wife and dismembered her body in the bath-tub; Jeff also theorized that the dog had become "too inquisitive," so Thorwald had to dig up some incriminating object (Mrs. Thorwald's ring or the saw or knife) from the flower bed and move it elsewhere, and then murdered the snooping dog
• to confront the possible killer, Jeff had Lisa deliver an anonymous note to his door asking: "WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH HER?" and she barely missed being detected; the group watched as Lars looked in his wife's handbag (with her gold ring inside?) and then packed it in his suitcase; Lisa and Stella also daringly suggested digging in the garden for evidence (while Thorwald was lured away to the nearby Albert Hotel), but when they didn't find anything in the garden, Lisa impulsively decided to enter Thorwald's apartment (via the fire-escape and an open living room window) to look for the wife's wedding ring; meanwhile, 'Miss Lonelyhearts' was conducting a distracting suicide attempt on the ground floor due to her failure to find a suitable companion
• in the film's most suspenseful scene, Lisa tensely explored and searched in suspected wife-murderer Thorwald's apartment for incriminating evidence - she was ecstatic when she found the alligator hand-bag, but it was empty, so she then turned to keep looking for his wife's favorite jewelry - left behind; as she held up the necklace, Jeff nervously reacted as Thorwald returned, and he watched powerlessly and helplessly from across the courtyard as Lisa became trapped and was confronted face-to-face in the apartment by Thorwald; caught, she handed over the necklace and then was assaulted; as she struggled with Thorwald in the dark, Lisa was rescued when the police arrived in the apartment's corridor just in time to prevent any serious injury

Using Lisa to Infiltrate Into Thorwald's Apartment

• during questioning, to signal that she had found the wedding ring, Lisa pointed to Thorwald's wife's wedding ring on her own finger that she waved behind her back; Lars noticed her signals and the wedding ring, and followed the sight-line of the signal sent by Lisa (behind her back) to Jeff in his apartment and triangulated the view - he spotted the mortal threat
• Thorwald looked up and discovered that Jeff, his tormentor, was watching from the apartment window across the courtyard, looking directly into his telephoto lens; it was the first time he had noticed the voyeuristic spy in the apartment complex - it was a chilling moment in the film as he saw the threatening spectator and knew where he lived; Thorwald was alerted to the fact that he was being watched, and the tables were now turned
• Jeff was left alone in his apartment when Stella left to bail Lisa out of jail for possible first-offense burglary charges; after Det. Doyle called and listened to Jeff's further suspicions, he promised to "run it down" and release Lisa from jail without the need of bail money; when Jeff's phone rang again, Jeff didn't wait to hear who the caller was, assuming it was Tom; he blurted out: "Tom, I think Thorwald's left. I don't...Hello.."; the phone clicked off and disconnected - Jeff slowly realized his error - it was not Tom, his detective friend; he noticed that Thorwald's apartment remained dark, and turned his wheelchair over closer toward his front door as he heard heavy footsteps climbing the stairs outside his apartment
• in the tension-filled finale, when Jeff was confronted by the killer in his own apartment - he grabbed his flash equipment and a long box of flashbulbs to protect himself; then, he positioned himself in front of his rear window so that he was darkly silhouetted by it; eventually, the dark figure of Thorwald slowly opened the door, entered, and queried Jeff: "What do you want from me? Your friend, the girl, could have turned me in. Why didn't she? What is it you want? A lot of money? I don't have any money. Say something. Say something. Tell me what you want! Can you get me that ring back?"
• at first, Jeff fended him off with bright flash-bulb flashes from his camera and its exploding flash mechanism - once, twice, three times, and then a fourth time; each whitish-blue flashbulb flash was followed by a red after-glow filling the entire frame, from Thorwald's dazed perspective; but then Jeff was attacked and became a victim of attempted strangulation
• Thorwald dumped Jeff out of the wheelchair and through the open window, where he dangled from the window ledge three floors above the courtyard as Thorwald tried to push him to his death; Lisa, Stella, Doyle and other detectives arrived at Thorwald's apartment and were alerted to Jeff's predicament; a group of officers grabbed Lars from behind at the last minute, but Jeff let go from the ledge and fell backwards to the ground below - his fall to the courtyard was partially broken by two detectives beneath him; reunited, Jeff's head was cradled in Lisa's arms as she heard him congratulate her: "I'm proud of you"
• Jeff learned that his suspicions were well-founded - a detective shouted down to Doyle: "Thorwald's ready to take us on a tour of the East River" - he had confessed; he murdered his wife, dismembered her, and distributed his wife's body parts in various locations; Thorwald also said that the dog had become "too inquisitive" and he was forced to dig up Mrs. Thorwald's head from the flower garden bed and move it to a hat box in his apartment
• in the film's epilogue composed of a lengthy tracking shot around the apartment complex, 'Miss Lonelyhearts' thanked the composer for his music that saved her life; Thorwald's vacated apartment was being repainted; the dog-couple had acquired a new puppy, 'Miss Torso' greeted her Army-uniformed soldier boyfriend (or husband?) and true love Stanley, and the newlyweds were seen quarreling with each other
• the camera rested on Jeff with his back to his rear window, now with a cast on both of his broken legs; the ending shot was of a masculine-dressed, pants-wearing Lisa reading an adventure tale - Beyond the High Himalayas, by William O. Douglas; after noticing that Jeff was asleep and not watching her, she switched off her male image by putting down her material and assertively substituting her own preferred Harper's Bazaar magazine

Ending Sequence

• the deeply ironic final shot was of a window shade rolling down on the voyeuristic film audience before the ending Paramount Studios logo