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source: Rear Window

As far as I know, this is a huge favorite with older folks. Kids of today would be bored to death with this famous Alfred Hitchcock film. I went on a bit of a roller-coaster ride myself regarding how I viewed this movie. When I first saw it on the big screen as a kid, I was fascinated and almost terrified at the end. Years later, watching it twice within five years on VHS, I found it boring with Grace Kelly's dialog annoyingly corny and dated. Recently I viewed it again - a fourth try - and absolutely loved it. Next to Psycho, it's now my favorite Hitchcock film. Yeah, it's still dated quite a bit, and, in future viewings, I might fast-forward through a couple of talky parts with Kelly or Thelma Ritter. I would prefer to stick with the focus of the story, namely Stewart's voyeurism and suspicions of what is going on in Raymond Burr's apartment. That storyline is entertaining and builds tremendous suspense. Stewart is usually fun to listen to, anyway. Kelly is there for looks. Speaking of dated, can you imagine all the people in the apartments keeping their blinds open all the time, and Stewart keeping his door unlocked all the time as well, and people entering without bothering to knock first? True, it was more trusting and safer world back then, but it couldn't have been THAT transparent and trusting. Give me a break! Yet, credibility aside, it's so involving and fun to watch that who cares if doesn't make a lot of sense?

I love Hitchcocks' movies--he was undoubtedly one of the greatest directors of our time--but what's the big deal about this movie. It's well-directed (obviously) and the acting is good, but the story is predictable, the dialogue dull (except for a few of Thelma Ritter's wisecracks) and it's just plain boring! Also I can't seriously accept the fact that someone as beautiful and classy as Grace Kelly would fall in love with Stewart. He's old enough to be her father! So, I don't see why everybody loves this film, and I consider it one of Hitchcocks' lesser works.

This is a very good film--definitely one of Hitchcock's best films and very suspenseful. But when I noticed on IMDb that it is ranked #16I was shocked. I just can't accept that this is the 16th best movie out there. If you thought about it, I'm sure most everyone reading this would be able to pick more than 16 better films with little problem. Jimmy Stewart, the star of this film, himself probably did a hand full of other films that should be ranked higher than this movie (such as MR. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON, THE MORTAL STORM, ANATOMY OF A MURDER and several others come to mind). Now my rant about it being over-rated is NOT to say this is a bad film. As far as suspense films go, it's one of the better ones and the only Hitchcock film I like more is NORTH BY NORTHWEST--and only by a shade. The acting is just fine, the script is excellent and the scares are intense. It's also amazingly innovative the way an entire New York neighborhood was recreated in a sound stage! Truly original and a must-see for suspense film buffs.

Many reviewers and critics have commented on Alfred Hitchcock's theme of the voyeur in Rear Window (the mere thought of a voyeur in a suspense film conjures up images from other classic Hitchcock films), and I felt that voyeuristic bug as well. But I realized something that I hadn't thought of as I watched it for the first time- this is a return for Hitchcock to his skills as a master of silent-film chills. As L.B. Jeffries (Jimmy Stewart in one of his most infamous performances) is in his wheelchair viewing out one perspective to other inhabitants in the apartment, the audience views right along-side him. So, for more or less 50 percent of the film, the only sounds we hear are the sounds of mere realism, as Hitch's camera keeps a close eye on things. As the thrills build in the second hour of the film there is considerably more dialog than the first hour. This could, and occasionally does, present a challenge for the audience member that could either be accepted & payed off or resented- can one sit back and just watch things unfold as in a film from the 20's? Personally, the experience of seeing these events unfold and increase was near electrifying. Along with Stewart's performance, which ranges from amusing to terrified, compelling to frightened (i.e. Hitch's 'everyday man'), there's Grace Kelly as Lisa, who carries her own beauty & inner conflicts, and Raymond Burr as Thorvold, who could have things going a little better with his wife. If we empathize with Jeff, it's because we become as much apart of his mind-set/POV as he already is, and that's the ticket to the film's true success. Not only is there a magnetic kind of skill to which Hitchcock (and cinematographer Robert Burks) presents us with the apartments' supporting and minor characters and how their fates are played out against the enclosed backdrop, but the psychology of Jeff becomes parallel, or against, to the audience's. This is the story of one man's temptation and compulsion to be involved with those he can see (much like movie-goers have with any given film), and how perception of the realities around him become ours. Rear Window may have become dated for some movie-goers, particularly since the theme has been played on by other movies and TV shows (like The Simpsons for example). Yet there is a certain effectiveness to it all, even in the earlier scenes, that holds an edge over imitators. A+