Rear Window

I haven't been to many movies in the Fathom's Big Screen Classics series this year but I just couldn't resist Rear Window in honor of its 70th Anniversary.  Alfred Hitchcock is one of my favorite directors and this is widely considered to be one of his best movies so I was really excited to see it on the big screen for the first time.  I found it to be incredibly riveting.  L.B. "Jeff" Jeffries (James Stewart) is a photojournalist who has been incapacitated by a broken leg and is confined to a wheelchair.  Because he has nothing else to do he spends most of his time watching all of his neighbors across the courtyard from his window.  After he hears a scream in the middle of the night and sees a man named Lars Thorwald (Raymund Burr) leaving his apartment with a large suitcase multiple times, he becomes convinced that Lars murdered his invalid wife when he doesn't see her the next morning.  He enlists the help of Lisa Fremont (Grace Kelly), his socialite girlfriend, Stella (Thelma Ritter), the nurse hired to care for him, and Tom Doyle (Wendell Corey), a buddy from the war now working as a detective in the NYPD, to help him investigate.  However, the man he views through the telephoto lens of his camera eventually gets a little too close for comfort.  What makes this so compelling is that we in the audience are also voyeurs just like Jeff because we see everything from his POV (many of the shots are framed as if being viewed through his telephoto lens) so we are just as eager to solve the crime as he is.  It is an incredibly clever conceit.  The suspense is almost unbearable, particularly in a scene where Lisa is in danger of discovery from Thorwald because Jeff cannot do anything to save her.  I loved the dichotomy in the characters of Jeff and Lisa because he is a man of action but cannot take any action while she is viewed as frivolous but is more capable than she appears.  All of the technical aspects, especially the complicated set, the atmospheric lighting, and the diegetic sound design, are very well done and definitely enhance the mood.  I was surprised by how much more I enjoyed this movie seeing it on the big screen so I definitely recommend this series.  Go here for more information if you are interested.