Rear Window
Our look at iconic fifties movies continues today, and we have turned the spotlight on Alfred Hitchcock.
There are a whole host of great Hitchcock movies from this decade - any of which we could have talked about - but Rear Window is one of our favourites.
Released in 1954, Rear Window is based on the short story from Cornell Woolrich, and is widely regarded as one of Hitchcock's best films.
Starring James Stewart and Grace Kelly, Rear Window follows L.B. 'Jeff' Jefferies, a wheelchair bound photographer who begins spying on his neighbours from his apartment window. However, she soon becomes convinced that one of them has committed murder.
Hitchcock has always been the master of suspense and we get that in buckets in Rear Window, as it is a taunt and edge of your seat thriller from start to finish.
Rear Window is one of the finest examples of the slow-burn thriller that I have ever seen, as Hitchcock cranks up the tension and the suspense frame-by-frame and moment by moment.
There is also a claustrophobic feeling that hangs over the whole of the film, as the apartment gives feeling of enclosement and being trapped: something that really works wonderfully for the film and sends a shiver down your spine.
There is a darkness to the role of Jefferies, and Stewart is perhaps not the first actor that you would think of to fill this part.
However, he gives a terrific central performance, as a man who just likes to look. He is very much the way into the movie for the audience, as we all go on this adventure with him. Did we see what we thought we saw? Did our eyes deceive us? His journey very much becomes that of the audience.
Grace Kelly was one of Hitchcock's greatest heroines, and he really brought the best of out her as an actress: I would have loved to have seen her tackle a darker role with this director.
Kelly is at her elegant and Beautiful best in Rear Window, and she and Stewart make a terrific film team.
Many of Hitchcock's movies have stood the test of time, and Rear Window is one of them. You will not see too many thrillers better than this and it remains a film that all others in this genre are measured against.
Tagged in Alfred Hitchcock