Rear Window Review

Click here to go to my previous review of Rang De Basanti 

 Spoiler Alert

Number 35 on the top 1000 films of all time is Alfred Hitchcock's 'Rear Window.'

What's it about: L.B "Jeff" Jeffries (James Stewart) plays a photojournalist who is confined to a wheelchair for weeks on end, after breaking his leg.  To relieve his boredom, he begins spying on his neighbours through his apartment's rear window.  It is there where he begins to suspect that one of his neighbours has murdered their wife.

The Good: For the most part, the film is interesting and engaging.  The film isn't hampered by having a small cast and only two or three set, on the contrary, it is the better for it.  The tiny set of Jeffries' apartment helped to convey the claustrophobia that he was feeling at the time.  This was further improved by the camerawork.  There are a number of POV shots of Jeffries spying on his neighbours using his binoculars or camera.  This helped to put the audience in Jeffries' shoes and made him a more relatable character.

The bad: I would argue that this film took a while to get going, and whilst you could argue that Hitchcock was just setting the scene and really trying to convey the boredom that Jeffries was feeling, I felt that the film was slow throughout.  I was only engaged with it at times, but other times I was quite bored.  I knew that Hitchcock was building tension throughout, but this tension never reached me, and as a result I was not glued to the screen.

The Ugly: The antagonist is a very ugly character for killing a poor defenceless doggy.

Rating: Good

A good film that makes good use of a small cast and a few different sets, but it wasn't interesting throughout and that's why it's only good.  Although, what could be said for the antagonist is that he is a character with definitely more then 50 shades of morally grey.

 Click here to go to my next review of 50 Shades of Grey