Rear Window Study Guide, Assignments of Designs and Groups

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Rear Window Study Guide

Alfred Hitchcock, 1954, USA, 112 mins

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2 Stella ............................................................................................................................. 30 Tom Doyle .................................................................................................................... 31 Apartment dwellers ....................................................................................................... 31 Lars Thorwald ............................................................................................................... 31 Miss Torso .................................................................................................................... 32 Miss Lonelyhearts ......................................................................................................... 32 .

3 REAR WINDOW STUDY GUIDE INTRODUCTION Rear Window is a classic film and is often quoted and referenced in other screen texts. 1 This is not just because it is so witty and well-made, but because it is the definitive film about the experience of watching. Rear Window asks viewers to consider how they engage with film narratives and how their ideas and values align with those presented in the narrative. It is a real advantage when you study Rear Window to have the opportunity to watch it on a big screen, in a darkened cinema, as part of an audience. This may not be possible, so try to maximise your viewing experience by watching it all the way through in a darkened room and without distractions. Give yourself up to the journey that it takes you on. The director of Rear Window , Alfred Hitchcock, is a renowned filmmaker and is known as the master of suspense. Keep this in mind when you are watching the film as well as when you are building your interpretation. Keep in mind that suspense is about how the audience feels and responds to the events taking place in the narrative. One of the reasons Hitchcock was such a popular filmmaker is that he had an expert understanding of how to shoot and edit a film to draw viewers into the story and elicit a particular set of responses from them. Along with the suspense, Hitchcock uses comedy to draw viewers into the story. The interweaving of comedy and suspense gives the narrative a rhythm: suspense is about keeping viewers on the edge of their seats, while the comedy (delivered through dialogue and visual jokes) adds a lot of fun along the way. And sometimes the two elements come together, such as the moment when Thorwald looks straight down the camera lens. This gives viewers a fright because of the suspense that has been built up around Jeff’s investigation of Thorwald’s crime, but the initial gasp often turns into a laugh as viewers realise Jeff has finally been caught out. AFTER VIEWING It is always a good idea after watching a film to reflect on your response to the film and think about what led to that response.

• Give yourself a ten-minute time limit and write down everything you can remember about your responses while watching, the elements that particularly stood out, the ideas generated. 1 For instance, you won’t be surprised it has been referenced in The Simpsons

5 attention to detail is very much in evidence in Rear Window with the careful design of the shots, the light and the mise-en-scène being a significant element of a project that left nothing to chance. Because Hitchcock is such an interesting and beloved filmmaker, you will find an enormous amount of criticism and commentary online about his filmmaking in general and Rear Window in particular. Some of this is great and some of it misguided. It is always interesting to explore and consider new ideas, but make sure that you think carefully about other people’s comments and test them with reference to the film. 2 This also applies to your own interpretation. Make sure that what you are writing about Rear Window can be supported with evidence from the text. Explore further You can get a quick intro to Hitchcock’s work and signature style in this short video.

• As well as elements that relate to Rear Window , note those elements that are not part of the Rear Window narrative.
• Consider what their absence reveals, particularly about the claustrophobic nature of the Rear Window narrative. Hitchcock LOVED discussing the concepts and planning that underpinned his filmmaking and unique approach to suspense. Check out each of these quotes and apply them to your experience of watching Rear Window :
• The difference between mystery and suspense
• “There’s a great confusion between the words ‘mystery’ and ‘suspense’ — and the two things are actually miles apart. You see, mystery is an intellectual process, like in a whodunnit. But suspense is essentially an emotional process. Therefore, you can only get the suspense element going by giving the audience information.”
• The ‘bomb under the table’ analogy
• “Four people are sitting around a table, talking about baseball or whatever you’d like. Five minutes of it. Very dull. Suddenly a bomb goes off. Blows the people to smithereens. What does the audience have? Ten seconds of shock. Now, take the same scene and tell the audience there is a bomb under that table and [it] will go off in five minutes. Well, the whole emotion of the audience is totally different, because you’ve given them that information.” 2 Jason Fraley’s blog post on the Film Spectrum website is a good summary but be aware that he mistakenly identifies th woman in the negative and on the cover of the magazine as Lisa – it isn’t. He also misspells diegetic! https://thefilmspectrum.com/?p= If you are looking for something a bit meatier, you can access online a pdf of the introduction of an excellent collection of essays about Rear Window published by Cambridge University Press. John Belton, “Introduction: Spectacle and Narrative”, Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window, CUP, Cambridge 2000 http://catdir.loc.gov/catdir/samples/cam032/99012160.pdf

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• Leave the shock and horror to the audience’s own imagination
• “There is one difference between what I prefer to make and very often what you see. And that is to convey, visually, certain elements in storytelling that transfer itself to the mind of the audience. Whereas other films make visual statements so that the audience becomes a spectator… that’s why you see a lot of blood on the screen. There’s no subtlety about it because you present it to the audience in the visual form, and that’s it. Whereas I prefer to suggest something and let the audience figure it out.” 3 James Stewart James Stewart, who plays L. B. Jefferies the protagonist of Rear Window , was a beloved Hollywood leading man. He typically played sensitive, sympathetic heroes, albeit instilling them with nuance and complexity. Audiences watching Rear Window in 1954 would have found Stewart’s portrayal of Jeff very different from previous characters he had played. He was also known for his distinguished service in the air force during WWII. Grace Kelly Known for her cool elegance and beauty, Grace Kelly was playing against type in her portrayal of Lisa as a sexually assertive career woman. Kelly’s performance reveals that refinement and passion can co-exist in a character. Lisa was chic and driven by physical desire, and offered audiences of the period a new and more complex type of female character and a new and more complex approach to female sexuality. Thelma Ritter It is hard to imagine the role of Stella being played by someone other than Thelma Ritter, who typically played characters who are sardonic, observant and shrewd. Stella is an integral character in Rear Window , and she initially presents as the wisecracking voice of reason, but she is gradually drawn into Jeff’s obsession. It could be argued that Stella represents the film viewer, who also becomes caught up in the mystery that Jeff is investigating. THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT: POST-WAR USA Although Rear Window highlights Jeff’s claustrophobic isolation in his room and the constrained parameters of the world that he engages with, in many subtle ways it references the complex, multifaceted and evolving nature of American society at this time. This is post- war America; it is less than a decade since this period defined by loss of life and social upheaval came to an end. The position of women and the family 3 I have taken these great quotes from thescriptlab https://thescriptlab.com/features/screenwriting-101/9806- 3 - writing-lessons-on-suspense-from-alfred-hitchcock/

8 In his essay “Architecture of the Gaze”, Steven Jacobs expands this idea: Instead of an absolute privacy behind doors and walls, the courtyard is characterized by a conditional or mediated form of privacy, which is based on the knowledge that others can watch but usually do not. It is a delicate social balance based on the collective use of spaces and on implicit rules of conduct between neighbors. Precisely the relative isolation and the lack of interference in the everyday life of others are the attractive elements of big city life. The story of Rear Window is unthinkable in a small town or in suburbia since the balance between individualism and collectivity is completely different in such places. 4 Masculinity in crisis With the arrival of Lieutenant Doyle, we learn that Jeff and Doyle flew planes in the war, a fragment of information that provides an important clue about why Jeff might be the way that he is. Many returned servicemen struggled to accommodate themselves to both civilian and domestic life after the war, and Jeff would seem to be in this boat. Domesticity and family life were presented as an ideal during this period but the reality of people’s experience in private could never measure up to the public representation of what life in the home should look like. As mentioned above, women struggled with these expectations but it was the difficulty many men had adapting to family life in the suburbs and coping with the role of breadwinner that was discussed most openly. It is this popular representation of the male perspective that Jeff is referring to in his discussion with his editor. During the 1950s books and articles suggested there was a crisis in masculinity as many men felt their lives had become limited and constrained. The narrative of Rear Window primarily channels this struggle over what it means to be a man through the character of Jeff, but also – at least as seen from Jeff’s perspective – through the other male characters, particularly Thorwald, the Composer and the Newlywed. A lot of the comedy is generated by Jeff’s anxiety about his male identity and his resort to spying on his neighbours to reassure himself that he is still powerful and in control. Surveillance and the McCarthy Era Through his surveillance, as well as through his limited perspective, Jeff invokes the mood of suspicion and distrust that circulated in American society at this time. During the period known as the Cold War, people were both fearful of the threat of communism and of the threat of being named as a communist sympathiser. While there is absolutely no reference to these fears in Rear Window , viewers of the period would have been very aware of the roaming camera in the opening scene (where the viewers are the ones surveilling the neighbourhood) and the implications of Jeff’s continual spying on his neighbours. When Jeff wakes up and begins the process of watching (while talking to his editor) the appearance of the helicopter and its all-seeing pilot hovering over the apartments foregrounds this theme. Explore further

• The Khan Academy website provides some very well explained and thoughtful information about this period such as: the threat of Communism, family values 4 “Architecture of the Gaze: Jeffries Apartment and Courtyard”, in Toward a New Interior , ed. Lois Weinthal, Princeton University Press Princeton NJ, 2011 https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/55854539.pdf

9 and the rise of suburbia. Have a look at it and take notes on the connections with Rear Window.

• How does finding out more about the historical context of Rear Window add to your understanding? Which events and characters does this information shed light on?
• How differently from present-day viewers do you think audiences of the time would have responded to Hitchcock’s portrayal of the Rear Window community? THE TEXT Narrative Hitchcock used many of the features and elements of the classical Hollywood realist narrative form in making his films. This kind of storytelling was established in the very early days of Hollywood cinema and is one of the reasons Hollywood films became so successful. 5 Typical features of this style include:
• the three-act structure

1. opening that sets up the characters and their story
2. middle based on plot and character development
3. final act where a resolution is reached.

• Two plot lines: heterosexual romance plus another – in this case, the murder mystery
• events organised through cause and effect
• viewers encouraged to adopt the point of view of a protagonist or main character
• viewers enter the world of the story as if it is real
• continuity editing draws viewers into the story
• incorporates a set of familiar camera shots and techniques
• follows established rules around sound and music For many years, this way of telling a story became so familiar that it was accepted as the natural way to construct a film narrative. Familiar narrative techniques – the ones 5 You can check out this short definition here: http://www.filmreference.com/encyclopedia/Independent-Film-Road- Movies/Narrative-CLASSICAL-REALISM.html

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• If you want to find out more about the development of this way of telling

stories on film, you can read the short definition here (but ignore the paragraphs

on D.W. Griffith). Two intertwined plots David Bordwell is a renowned film theorist who identified the presence of two plot lines as a narrative convention associated with classical Hollywood films, with “one involving heterosexual romance, the other line involving another sphere—work, war, a mission or quest, other personal relationships, each line will possess a goal, obstacles and a climax.” 6 In Rear Window , the romance and thriller plots are cleverly intertwined one feeding into the other so that, as Jeff gets more and more fearful of Lisa’s desire, he also gets more and more drawn into watching the lives of his neighbours and interpreting what he sees in relation to his life. His suspicions in relation to Lars Thorwald and his wife grow as he grapples with his ambivalent feelings for Lisa and his fear of her getting too close. Once Lisa becomes actively involved in helping Jeff solve the mystery, he allows her to get closer to him while also using her (and Stella) as stand-in detectives. They get close to the source of the mystery, while he stays at a safe distance. When the mystery is solved, the romance is resolved. Lisa and Jeff end up together, but in keeping with Hitchcock’s strategy of alerting the audience to the artificial nature of the narrative style and structure they are so used to, the resolution highlights Jeff’s ’captivity’ and incapacity. Explore further Alfred Hitchcock often expressed an affection for a narrative device that he called a MacGuffin, an object or event that motivates the events of the story but is not itself important. In Rear Window , the MacGuffin is Mrs Thorwald’s death – an event that quite shockingly seems to make no impression on anyone. Instead, her death allows the intertwined romance and thriller plots play out until they achieve resolution.

• Find out more about this device in this helpful blog post. Jeff’s point of view In 1954 viewers expected film narratives to be told from the point of view of a white, male, heterosexual protagonist and that he would drive the story forward with his actions and deeds. 7 The characterisation of Jeff disrupts this expectation because of the limitations of his perspective. Rather than taking viewers on an adventure, Jeff is stuck not only in his apartment but in his limited mindset. The audience is trapped with Jeff’s narrow perspective, a perspective that limits understanding of and connection with the rear window community Jeff observes. 6 ”Classical Hollywood Cinema: Narrative Principles and Procedures”, in Narrative, Apparatus, Ideology , ed. Philip Rosen, Columbia University Press, New York, 1985, pp.18- 19 7 There were many famous female stars who had the role of protagonist in a genre of films known as the “woman’s film”. Despite their popularity, these films were considered a subset of mainstream filmmaking.

12 The audience’s captivity within Jeff’s perspective means that they not only become complicit with Jeff and his voyeuristic looking but are also made aware of their position as Peeping Toms. Throughout the film a recurring motif is the ethics of looking at and making assumptions about other lives from a distance, an approach that highlights Hitchcock’s fascination with the power of cinema and the deep connection it makes to people’s deepest fears and desires. This process of looking also highlights the individualism that is such a focus of narrative film within the classical period of Hollywood. Think about how many Hollywood films are about individual achievement, particularly that of an active male protagonist. Jeff, in his self-appointed role as vigilante determined to solve the mystery of the Thorwalds is potentially one of these heroes, but Hitchcock demonstrates to us the disconnection and self-absorption that characterises his point of view. Viewers not only share Jeff’s point of view for most of the film but are also drawn into his fantasy that the lives in front of him are being played out for his own entertainment and pleasure – it is as if, for him, the individuals he observes only exist when he is looking at them. A great way to remind yourself about how much influence Jeff has over the version of the neighbourhood presented to viewers through much of the narrative is to compare the view of the world presented when he is awake with what viewers learn about the community in the opening/prologue and the conclusion/epilogue/coda when he is asleep. These framing scenes are significant structural elements. They frame and contain the suspense narrative aligned with Jeff’s point of view and present a different and more connected version of the community from the one that he constructs – in fact, he is blind to any sense of community. Explore further

• In what ways is Jeff a conventional Hollywood protagonist? (To get you started: he is the focus of the leading lady’s desire.)
• List the ways that Jeff’s characterisation undermines his status as hero of the story. Voyeurism As Jeff looks in at the private lives of the people in his neighbourhood, he becomes a voyeur. The pleasure of the voyeur relates to the power of watching someone without them resisting or countering the look by looking back. People become vulnerable and powerless if they don’t know they are being observed or if others intrude on areas considered private. Imposing this vulnerability on someone gives the voyeur a sense of dominance and authority. Jeff’s profession as a photographer means that he is “accustomed to nosing into other people’s affairs and own[s] an arsenal of professional viewing devices (binoculars, telephoto lens), [that] he eagerly deploys to spy on his neighbors”. 8 Secret and controlling Jeff’s 8 Jacobs, Steven, “Architecture of the Gaze: Jeffries Apartment & Courtyard.” In Toward a New Interior : an Anthology of Interior Design Theory , ed. Lois Weinthal, Princeton Architectural Press, New York, NY, 2011, 546– 558 https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/55854539.pdf

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• What would Jeff learn by doing this?
• Would you agree that this is a key message of the film?
• How does this comment foreshadow subsequent events? This is a terrific summary of the visual language and narrative techniques Hitchcock uses in Rear Window to highlight the theme of voyeurism.
• Focus on each element and match it with your own examples taken from the film. Explore even further The following info is for those of you who want to dig a bit deeper into the theme of voyeurism (but you absolutely don’t have to!) In a number of his films, Hitchcock demonstrates his fascination with Freudian psychoanalysis. Rear Window ’s exploration of voyeurism foregrounds Freud’s notion that the secretive controlling gaze is fuelled by the male fear of castration. Hitchcock even creates a pun in relation to this theory with Jeff in a plaster cast up to his waist to reinforce his panic- stricken response to the threat Lisa poses to his perception of himself as an active and powerful man. Jeff fears Lisa’s sexual assertiveness so that when he is in her company, he is constantly looking out of the window as if to reassure himself that he is still whole and intact.
• Watch the scene (and listen to the dialogue) where Lisa is in Jeff’s arms trying to inspire some passion in him, while he is captivated by what is going on in the neighbours’ apartments and reveals that rather than fantasising about Miss Torso’s beauty, he is trying to work out how Thorwald managed to dispose of his wife’s body. Bookending Note how the closing scene echoes the film’s opening. In the conclusion, Jeff is asleep with his back to the window while the life of the neighbourhood goes on around him. He is in the same position as when he is introduced in the opening scene. When the closing scene refers back to the opening scene like this, it is called bookending and the purpose of bookending is to make viewers think about what has or has not changed as a result of the events that have made up the story. Explore further
• Make a list of what has and has not changed by the conclusion of the narrative.
• Explain what each of these elements reveals.

15 As well as communicating a (little) bit more about what has happened to Jeff and Lisa, the final scene reveals new details about the lives of the apartment dwellers Jeff has been so fascinated by. In each case, the new information surprises audience expectations.

• How does the conclusion reinforce the limitations of Jeff’s perspective?
• Why is it significant that Jeff is asleep while these scenarios play out? Mise-en-scène Mise-en-scène is a term that comes from theatre and relates to the “staging of the scene”, it basically means everything that you can see at a particular moment in a film. The term for the actual process of placing actors and objects is the blocking of the scene. It refers to visual elements such as: set, props, costume, actors, colour, lighting and composition (where things and people are placed within the frame and in relation to each other). Mise-en- scène is often used to discuss the overall look or feel of a film or to home in on a scene and what it is being communicated through the visual language. One of the things you might notice about Rear Window ’s mise-en-scène is that the world is generally represented in subdued earthy tones — unsaturated colours -- highlighting that this is a gritty urban environment. But there are pops of saturated colour -- blue, red and green -- that really stand out within the subdued urban landscape. The colour patterns are a fascinating element of Rear Window with links made between: the blue sky, Jeff’s blue pyjamas and Thorwald, Doyle and Jeff’s blue eyes; Lisa and Miss Lonelyhearts’ green outfits and Mrs Thorwald’s green bedroom, the red flowers that are so closely associated with Thorwald but that also sit outside Miss Torso’s apartment; the woman in black and the black dress Lisa wears the following day. When exploring mise-en-scène in Rear Window , the detail that has gone into the set is something to really think about. Hitchcock’s films are very carefully designed, and each element has a purpose. With this in mind, take the time to look carefully at the interior design of each of the apartments, as well as to focus on what they look like from the outside as well. You can learn a great deal about the characters that Jeff watches. Just as Jeff’s apartment is filled with information about him, so too are the other characters’ apartments. During the first viewing of Rear Window , Jeff’s blinkered perspective is so dominant, but on a second viewing, viewers have wider information that gives them the ability to question Jeff’s dismissal of Mrs Thorwald as a nagging wife – it is very likely she is furious about Thorwald’s relationship with the woman in black. And just looking at the Thorwalds’ apartment and noticing the care that has gone into its decoration provides a more nuanced vision of their marriage. Their apartment is also distinguished by the pretty red geraniums on the fire escape, while Lars Thorwald tends the flowers in the garden with loving care. Miss Lonelyhearts’ apartment is distinguished by the warm shade of pink she has painted her walls communicating her romantic personality as well as the fact that while she may be lonely and unhappy, she has made her home pretty and welcoming. Miss Torso’s apartment is a simple studio -- she is a young dancer and clearly not making a lot of money. The only detail that can be seen of the apartment of the couple with the dog is the white porcelain statue of a rearing horse, a clue to a private interior world that will never be revealed, just as the dog owner’s pain at her dog’s death offers an insight into her humanity that was absent from Jeff’s perspective.

17 The Rear Window set The set is such a significant part of the Rear Window story, it could almost be described as a character, with its own personality and impact. In fact, when planning how he was going to film Rear Window , Hitchcock foregrounded the set as the most significant element. It cost a fortune, along with its detailed lighting design, individualised apartments (some fully furnished with running water), elaborate exteriors and intricately landscaped yards. The story is primarily told from inside Jeff’s room, and the set is constructed in such a way as to make Jeff’s focal point central, supporting the narrative as seen from Jeff’s point of view. The set is structured and oriented so that Jeff’s apartment has a central position from which Jeff can survey the lives of his neighbours, giving him, for much of the narrative, a position of power – the power of the look. This power is supported by the fact that the camera doesn’t ‘look back’ at Jeff’s apartment until the scene where the dog dies. And it is not until Thorwald throws Jeff from the window of his apartment, that viewers see the apartment as part of a block in the same way as the apartments opposite: “the dominant point of view makes us forget that there may be on Jefferies’ side of the block other apartments from which one can see just as well and perhaps even better what goes on in Thorwald’s place”. 9 Because of the way that the camera and the set design support Jeff’s powerful point of view, it is almost as if the people in the apartments opposite are prisoners in their cells being guarded and surveilled by Jeff. That Jeff sees himself in these terms is emphasised during his first night-watch when he struggles to stay awake in order not to miss anything. (The joke is that he falls asleep and misses Thorwald’s return with the woman in black. In

fact, Jeff misses every significant event that takes place in the narrative.)

In the opening, the scene where the dog dies and the conclusion, the camera leaves Jeff’s apartment and reveals the connections between the apartments and the apartment inhabitants. However, viewed from Jeff’s perspective, the divisions between and within the apartments highlight the fragmentation of the collection of people living within the buildings, as well as their vulnerability as they live their lives as the unknowing focus of both Jeff and the audience’s surveillance. Because the separation of each household is emphasised by Jeff’s perspective, for much of the film viewers are encouraged to engage with Jeff’s fantasy that the lives in front of him are being played out for his own entertainment and pleasure. In fact, it has been suggested the windows are like screens that Jeff watches from his position in the apartment opposite. A further take on this idea is that the way Jeff switches his viewing from window to window is like changing TV channels. 10 For Jeff, the people in the apartments opposite only come to life when he is watching them – he imagines they only exist for his entertainment and are part of his story. Yet, as the opening scene emphasises, Jeff is much more a prisoner of his apartment and the rear 9 Steven Jacobs, ”Architecture of the Gaze: Jeffries Apartment and Courtyard”, in Toward a New Interior , ed. Lois Weinthal, Princeton University Press, Princeton NJ, 2011 https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/55854539.pdf 10 Sue Brower, ”Channeling Rear Window” , Journal of Popular Film and Television , Volume 44, Issue 2, pp. 89- 98 https://people.southwestern.edu/~bednarb/filmstudies/articles/brower.pdf

18 window world than anyone. Everyone else, with the exception of Mrs Thorwald, is continually coming and going. For most of the narrative, viewers are trapped in Jeff’s apartment with him, but are tantalised by glimpses of the world outside via the limited view of the busy street at the end of the lane, a view that reminds us of the many lives and stories beyond what Jeff sees. Explore further

• Take note of the glimpses of the world beyond the back area of the apartments. o What are some of the activities you notice? o Which activities counter and which confirm Jeff’s perspective on his community?
• Much has been written about the Rear Window set. You can find out further details on various fan sites.
• If you want to think more deeply about the way the set, space and architecture work to draw us into Jeff’s point of view, check out Architecture of the Gaze: Jeffries Apartment and Courtyard by Steven Jacobs. (Just note that Jacobs misspells Jefferies!)
• Compare the representation of the Rear Window community as seen from Jeff’s point of view with the scenes where viewers are set free from Jeff’s controlling gaze (the opening and closing scenes and the scene with the dead dog).
• Note how Jeff’s perspective never offers a sense of the community as a whole but views the lives in each of the apartments as if they are disconnected and lived in isolation. Soundscape As well as the physical set design, the world of the apartments is created through sound. The sound design is made up of dialogue, music and a range of sound effects. For most of the narrative, Jeff’s apartment is at the centre of the soundscape, with the layering of the sounds that come from outside his apartment highlighting the centrality of his perspective. The dominance of his aural perspective is challenged by the dog owner in the scene where she discovers her dog has been killed and, then again, in the films’ conclusion. In films sound can be diegetic or non-diegetic. Diegetic sound comes from the world of the film and can be heard by the characters within the story, whereas non-diegetic sound is not part of the story – viewers can hear it, but the characters can’t. The most common form of non-diegetic sound is the musical score and there were very few films made in Hollywood in the 1950s that didn’t feature a prominent orchestral score. Rear Window is distinctive because, apart from the jazzy intro and a few jaunty notes at the very end, all of the sound AND music is diegetic – it emanates from the world the narrative. This approach to sound