Hitchcock Takes his Obsession with Voyeurism to the Next Level

When the master of suspense adds a pinch of humor and romance in his recipe, the dish ought to be delicious! The protagonist Jeff (James Stewart) is bound by a wheelchair in a cramped 2-room apartment, practicing Hitchcock’s classic trope: voyeurism. This is not the first time Hitchcock is narrating a suspenseful story set in a cramped space (Lifeboat, Rope and Dial M for Murder being the previous ones), but in Rear Window, he ups the ante by trapping his audience as well as the camera in Jeff’s apartment.

Jeff, a passionate photojournalist is now trapped in his apartment with a heavy cast on his broken leg. He has a loyal girlfriend; Lisa Fremont (Grace Kelly), an elegant model and a fashion consultant, whom Jeff is foolish enough to ignore. He has another regular visitor- Stella who is an insurance company nurse with a nose for trouble (She predicted the market crash of 1929). For the first time in Hitchcock’s films, we see multiple characters in the story consistent from beginning to end. We see Jeff’s neighbours- Miss Torso, a dancer and an eye candy for many, Miss Lonelyheart who hosts dinners for her imaginary dates, a frustrated songwriter, a couple who lives with their beloved little dog, and then there is Mr. Thorwald, tired of his invalid wife who disappears into thin air one fine day. Jeff, who is keeping a close eye on his neighbours out of boredom suspects that a murder has taken place. He puts together different clues with the help of Lisa and Stella to prove that Thorwald has committed a murder.

In one way or the other, we all are caught up in Jeff’s vision. We might disapprove of Jeff’s voyeurism, but isn’t it the same what we all do when we go to the cinemas, sitting in a dark room observing people’s lives. The stories and activities he observes in different apartments is similar to different film genres like musical, romance, tragedy and most important of all- thriller. We hardly see anything that Jeff doesn’t. Jeff is a passive spectator just like we all are when we watch cinema, peeping into other people’s lives through a camera. The shots and the camera movements give us the actual experience of ‘looking’. The camera pans in a similar manner as our eyes move. We see a vignette when we see through Jeff’s binoculars or his camera (a portable keyhole as Stella calls it). We see what Jeff sees and we feel the same amount of thrill and frustration that Jeff feels when he finds a clue or suspects something. When Lisa is in danger, Jeff is as anxious, fearful and helpless as we all are.

Unlike Hitchcock’s other films, we see a character arc of the female protagonist Lisa. She first appears to be a sophisticated girl with a successful career in fashion but later adventurously parkours up a building in a flowy yellow summer dress and high heels. In the beginning, Jeff is critical about her for being materialistic and caring only about elegant dresses and fancy dinners but he eventually falls for her noticing her love for adventure. Jeff is a typical male with a big fat male ego that doesn’t let him accept a perfect woman as his wife. He likes her but his insecurities neither let her go nor allow him to accept her as his wife. Lisa Fremont is not an ordinary blonde in a Hitchcock film who either plays a victim or serves as a purpose of crime like Kim Novak in Vertigo or Grace Kelly in Dial M for Murder. She is an independent woman of free thoughts. She is loving, caring and ambitious. She doesn’t bow down to her man’s wishes for acceptance and she makes this quite clear when she puts down ‘Beyond the High Himalayas’ to pick up a Harper’s Bazaar. Lisa doesn’t change herself to get Jeff’s love; he rather just realizes how his perception about her was wrong.

Rear Window is different from other Hitchcock films in more than one way. It is leisurely paced and humourous throughout its duration. There is hardly any background music, except the jazzy tunes in the beginning and at the end. All the sounds we hear are diegetic- the piano notes, chattering of people in parties, pattering of rain down the roof and hustle-bustle of everyday activities in a noisy neighborhood. Hitchcock uses his classic formula of suspense and twists it a little bit in this film. The suspense rises slowly and hits a peak in the climax. Even though we never even witness the murder taking place, Hitchcock ingeniously binds you till the very end keeping the audience on their toes.

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Written by:

Muskan Sharma

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