A wheelchair-bound photographer spies on his neighbors from his Greenwich Village courtyard apartment window and, despite the skepticism of his fashion-model girlfriend, becomes convinced on... Read allA wheelchair-bound photographer spies on his neighbors from his Greenwich Village courtyard apartment window and, despite the skepticism of his fashion-model girlfriend, becomes convinced one of them has committed murder.A wheelchair-bound photographer spies on his neighbors from his Greenwich Village courtyard apartment window and, despite the skepticism of his fashion-model girlfriend, becomes convinced one of them has committed murder.
- Nominated for 4 Oscars
- 6 wins & 13 nominations total
- Dancer with Miss Torso
- (uncredited)
- Choreographer with Miss Torso
- (uncredited)
- Man with Miss Torso
- (uncredited)
- Minor Role
- (uncredited)
- Director
- Writers
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaThe film negative was damaged considerably as a result of color dye fading as early as the 1960s. Nearly all of the yellow image dyes had faded. Despite fears that the film had been irrevocably damaged, preservation experts were able to restore the film nearly to its original coloration.
- GoofsAfter Lisa sees Thorwald tie up the trunk and the camera dollies forward to a close up, there are creaks from the floorboards and footsteps heard from the camera crew.
- Quotes
Stella: How much do we need to bail Lisa from jail?
L.B. Jefferies: Well, this is first offense burglary, that's about $250. I have $127.
Stella: Lisa's handbag. Uh... 50 cents. I got $20 or so in my purse.
L.B. Jefferies: And what about the rest?
Stella: When those cops at the station see Lisa, they'll even contribute.
- Crazy creditsThe film is bookended with the opening and closing of window blinds across Jeff's rear window.
The opening titles appear on the former, and the Paramount logo appears on the latter.
- Alternate versionsThe film has been fully restored from original negatives in 1998 and a new negative has been created that resembles the original color scheme of the film. However, the first kissing scene had to be restored digitally because the source elements were in bad condition.
- ConnectionsEdited into Alfred Hitchcock: The Art of Making Movies (1990)
Besides this cheeky and impudent question, this is really a masterpiece, one of the films most loved by his director and one of his more sophisticated, both narratively as well as cinematographically. Loosely based on a relatively unknown 1942 short story written by Cornell Woolrich, It Had to Be Murder, Rear Window sees L.B. Jefferies, a successful photo reporter played with enough confidence and progressive involvement by James Stewart, confined in his New York small apartment with a broken and plastered leg. In the sweltering summer heat, he turns and focuses his attention and lenses to the neighbouring apartments facing his condo's backyard, observing them with a fast growing interest that rapidly becomes excited voyeurism when he starts suspecting that a uxoricide took place in an opposite flat. Albeit reluctantly, also his beautiful fiancée Lisa, a Grace Kelly whose first appearance in the film is one of the most esthetically captivating close ups in movies history and fully justifies the hot ice nickname given to her allegedly by Alfred Hitchcock, as well as both the solid, down to earth nurse Stella, caustically played by a vitriolic Thelma Ritter, and the reluctant detective Tom Doyle, a fairly stolid Wendell Corey full of banal common sense, are drawn into his obsession with what neighbour Lars Thorwald, an imposing Raymond Burr, might or might not have done to his nagging wife.
The opening credits reveal straight away one of the movie's multiple codes, when the curtains of James raise to reveal the fixed scene of the coming attraction, the very same back yard where all flats look into. From then on, a static journey begins that reverses many established principles of the 50s filmmaking: the main character does not move, all the other, secondary casts actually play in front of him. The viewer, barring a short yet important moment when James Stewart falls asleep, has the same point of view of the protagonist, sees and interprets the story through the eyes and expressions of him. The soundtrack comes from within the movie, mostly heard from one of the apartments where a musician is living.
All these filmic and narrative details, together with the crafted and perfect jigsaw of which each apartment and neighbours' live is a piece, are added to the self-conscious study of voyeurism and the essential role of cinema to make an essential film, where no shot, no dialogue is redundant, and an evergreen masterpiece, at the same time celebrating and subverting the Hollywood's codes. This is not the only Hitchcock's movie constructed in a theatrical form, but in no other the British master was able to extremize with such genius and depth of analysis the intertwined relationships between the eye and the mind, mixing like an esoteric alchemist obsessions and humor, suspense and sexuality, flashing light and silent darkness, individuality and collectivity, reality and perceptions. Peeping Toms of the world, unite!
- danielefanin-17409
- May 9, 2020
Details
- Release date
- Country of origin
- Language
- Also known as
- Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window
- Filming locations
- Stage 18, Paramount Studios - 5555 Melrose Avenue, Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA(Exterior court yard apartment complex)
- Production company
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
Box office
- Budget
- $1,000,000 (estimated)
- Gross US & Canada
- $36,764,313
- Gross worldwide
- $37,040,788
- Runtime1 hour 52 minutes
- Color
- Aspect ratio
- 1.37 : 1(original ratio)
- 1.66 : 1