Alfred Hitchcock 's Rear Window

Alfred Hitchcock’s film North by Northwest (1959) is famed as a classic man-on-the-run thriller, following protagonist Roger Thornhill as he flees across state lines in a mad dash to save his life and unravel the mystery to his extraordinary predicament. However, mid-way through the film Thornhill’s quandary is further complicated by the introduction of Eve Kendall, a beautiful yet mysterious woman he encounters on a train during his escape from the authorities and people trying to kill him. During the dining room scene on the train, Hitchcock expertly uses the camera to convey the characters thoughts and feelings. Interestingly, in a film that has several sequences with complicated cinematography and editing, the dining car scene is

In this essay, I shall try to illustrate whether analysing the movie Rear Window as a classical example of the Freudian concept of voyeurism, is appropriate. Voyeurism is defined in The Penguin dictionary of psychology as:

Voyeurism is originally defined as ‘the practice of gaining sexual pleasure from watching others when they are naked or engaged in sexual activity’. However, the term is also used to describe a general spying on, or having interest in, other people’s lives. This kind of voyeurism is the central theme for Alfred Hitchcock’s mystery thriller, Rear Window (1954). The film follows the boredom-induced curiosity of photographer L.B. ‘Jeff’ Jefferies. Bound to his wheelchair with a broken leg, he has little to do with his time, and finds himself looking into and involving himself in, the lives of his

Two examples that I find especially thought provoking are the Danziger studio and the Goldwyn Library. Built to blend into the local surroundings, the luxury residence was given a humble, rough exterior. Davis' explains that the rough exterior of the architecture reflects the underlying social phenomenon of "repression, surveillance and exclusion"(Davis, 224) that collectively forms the "fragmented, paranoid spatiality"(Davis, 229 ) that LA embodies. Moreover, The house's "camouflage"(Davis, 229 ) exterior creates a stark contrast to its luxurious interior, which places further emphasis on the exclusion and barrier between the "opulent"(Davis, 256) interior and the "rough"(Davis, 224 ) environment. I find Davis' assessment of the Daziger studio particularly agreeable and accurate as I truly believe that an architecture, its purpose and characteristic, sheds light to not only its physical environment but also its social environment, something that might not necessarily be as apparent. On the other hand, I find Davis' assessment of the Goldwyn library rather exaggerated. Judging from photos taken, the fifteen foot security wall is not as grotesque and 'fear-imposing' as Davis puts it. Davis described the library as "baroquely fortified...menacing...bizarre"(Davis, 246) and "paranoid"(Davis, 251). Although security and 'vandal-proof'' maybe, as Davis suggested, the initial goal of the design, I do not believe that it is as exaggerated as Davis

To see what they see, and compare our own thoughts with the evolution of the characters and the story. The dexterity of the images, and the impact that each scene has in portraying this theme, guide the viewer throughout the film with little use of dialogue and action. Our central character “Jeff,” is struggling with his casted imprisonment, his need for adventure is apparent as he watches outside his window. Conflicted with his girlfriend and conflicted with his theories, his character becomes more palpable, we begin to realize what is going on not only on the outside of him, but the inside of him as well. The aspects of the outside courtyard and the visual isolation of each apartment, help depict the humanity of each individual and sympathy for even the darkest characters. Hitchcock uses his camera, just as our protagonist does, to focus with him. The camera angles are depicted in a way to which we react with the character, rather than at the character, and eventually expose the minor elements of the story that bring to fruition the suspense of the movie and the thrills of discovery.

Alfred Hitchcock once defined his film Rear Window (Hitchcock, 1954), as the story of a man who cannot move and looks through a window, about what he sees and how he reacts to it (Truffaut, 1986). In addition, Hitchcock constructs the character of the protagonist of the film, Jeff (James Steward), not only by using cinematographic devices to show how Jeff interprets what he sees and his own life, but also stabilising a dichotomy between what he looks at and what he lives.

In this essay, I shall try to illustrate whether analysing the movie Rear Window as a classical example of the Freudian concept of voyeurism, is appropriate. Voyeurism is defined in The Penguin dictionary of psychology as:

Alfred Hitchcock’s film Shadow of a Doubt is a true masterpiece. Hitchcock brings the perfect mix of horror, suspense, and drama to a small American town. One of the scenes that exemplifies his masterful style takes place in a bar between the two main characters, Charlie Newton and her uncle Charlie. Hitchcock was quoted as saying that Shadow of a Doubt, “brought murder and violence back in the home, where it rightly belongs.” This quote, although humorous, reaffirms the main theme of the film: we find evil in the places we least expect it. Through careful analysis of the bar scene, we see how Hitchcock underlies and reinforces this theme through the setting, camera angles,

Alfred Hitchcock’s thriller ‘Rear Window’ (Hitchcock, 1954) begins with the immediate use of mise-en-scène in order to establish a sense of atmosphere, equilibrium and the mundane, soon to be disrupted as the events of the film unfold and are observed through the eyes of the voyeuristic protagonist, Jeff. Setting, cinematography and various other expressive mise-en-scène techniques work together to influence the overall appearance of the film. Though, by taking a closer look, these techniques reveal the significance of the narrative and characters. In the opening sequence, Hitchcock’s original visual style provides signposts for the audience to recognize what will be significant in the future: instead of establishing what is only happening in the moment in time; mise-en-scène is used to suggest what is to come. This arrangement of the “Classical Hollywood” narrative - starting with the setting and characters in a state equilibrium - acts as a seemingly all-purpose, archetypal opening by establishing location and introducing character. Simultaneously we can see that this sequence is vastly different from the rest of the film: it is leading the viewer into a false sense of security – the calm before the storm – as Jeff soon happens to piece together information leading to the possibility that one of his neighbors murdered their wife. This sequence is one of the only moments in the film we see things the protagonist does not, thus this carefully constructed opening is preparing

Throughout the world of suburbia, there seems to be a persistence of communities who attempt to create a perfect, enclosed world for the whole of the community to live in. By providing for everything that the inhabitants would ever want, suburbia is able to close itself off from those around it that it deems unworthy of belonging. While this exclusivity helps to foster the sense of community, it can also bring with it isolation from the outside, and also from within, and have disastrous results. Throughout the semester, there have been a number of works that have dealt the issue of isolation, but the greatest representation of a work whose physical qualities in its representation of suburbia help to

This peer-reviewed article Eros and agape in Alfred Hitchcock’s I Confess is written by Catherin O’Brien, who is a senior lecturer in Film Studies and French at Kingston University. With a very poetic title, this article focuses on the major conflict in Hitchcock’s I Confess, the love from God to human versus the love between human. In order to analysis and discuss such a tactile and sentimental issue, the author spends a large amount of space describing and interpreting the mise-en-scene. Although this article does not directly argue anything about Lepage’s film La Confessional, I believe it still has the value for providing the interpretation on the visual symbols which are used in both films. More importantly, as my proposed thesis suggests

As Berlin expanded amid an explosion of modern commodities, Simmel took note of th¬¬e rapidly increasing presence of both internal and external stimuli. He was suddenly living among strangers, aware of the sheer impersonality that cam¬¬e with a constantly changing environment. The people of Berlin were abruptly forced to think rationally rather than emotionally. They became desensitized due to overstimulation: no longer seeking connections to others, no longer possessing emotional constraints. All thoughts spawned from “the sphere of mental activity that is least sensitive and furthest removed from the depths of personality” (Simmel, 12). This intellectualism is definitive of life in any big city, for it is lacking all emphasis on personal

In his essay “Metropolis and Mental Life”, German sociologist, Georg Simmel, describes characteristics of big cities that influence individuals. Simmel writes that precision and punctuality is a basis for metropolitan life. He asserts that without “exact punctuality” a city’s economy would “break down into an inextricable chaos” (Simmel). Although Simmel claims that cities would be entropic without punctuality, there is a trade off between the disorder of the city and the disorder of minds of its inhabitants. The constant need to be aware of time in metropolitan areas affects the psychological state of individuals and leads many to find escapes of time.

This report will focus on the text ‘The Metropolis & Mental life’ by Georg Simmel and the key arguments of this primary text. It will start off with a key biography of himself and the influences which he had then will go onto explaining the contribution this key author makes to social theory.

In Simmel’s essay, “The Metropolis and Mental life”, he sets up an comparative image of rural and urban life, “with each crossing of the street, with the tempo and multiplicity of economic, occupational and social life, the city sets up a deep contrast with small town and rural life with reference to the sensory foundations of psychic life” (2). The metropolis demands a different type of consciousness than does rural life. The metropolitan man’s life and continually speeding up with little time for emotional growth. The emphasis here rests highly on the intellect and developing a keen understanding of academics and societal regularities, such as art, literature, and fashion. The pace of rural living is much more lethargic. Consequently more time is spent developing deep meaningful relationships with people. As Simmel also points out, a person in the city could spend their whole life not knowing their neighbor, while in the rural areas that would be completely unheard of (6). In essence, individuals in the city rely heavily in the intellect while those in rural areas put a great deal of emphasis on relationships, both of these are means of survival.