IMDb > Rear Window (1954)
Rear Window
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Rear Window (1954) More at IMDbPro »

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Rear Window (1954) -- A wheelchair bound photographer spies on his neighbours from his apartment window and becomes convinced one of them has committed murder.
Rear Window (1954) -- ZuGuide.com - Trailer (Flash)
Rear Window (1954) -- Sinematurk - Trailer (Flash)
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Overview

User Rating:
MOVIEmeter: ?
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Director:
Alfred Hitchcock
Writers:
John Michael Hayes (screenplay)
Cornell Woolrich (short story "It Had to Be Murder")
Contact:
View company contact information for Rear Window on IMDbPro.
Release Date:
14 January 1955 (Japan) more
Tagline:
Through his rear window and the eye of his powerful camera he watched a great city tell on itself, expose its cheating ways...and Murder! more
Plot:
A wheelchair bound photographer spies on his neighbours from his apartment window and becomes convinced one of them has committed murder. full summary | full synopsis
Plot Keywords:
more
Awards:
Nominated for 4 Oscars. Another 4 wins & 5 nominations more
NewsDesk:
(46 articles)
North By Northwest Blu-ray Review
 (From Collider.com. 7 November 2009, 10:02 AM, PST)

Posters To Drool On
 (From FilmExperience. 2 November 2009, 11:41 AM, PST)

User Comments:
Excellent. Sharp, clever, funny, inventive, with great values all round. more (466 total)
US TV Schedule:
Thur. Nov. 1210:00 PMTCM   

Cast

  (Cast overview, first billed only)

James Stewart ... L. B. 'Jeff' Jefferies

Grace Kelly ... Lisa Carol Fremont
Wendell Corey ... Det. Lt. Thomas J. Doyle
Thelma Ritter ... Stella
Raymond Burr ... Lars Thorwald
Judith Evelyn ... Miss Lonelyhearts
Ross Bagdasarian ... Songwriter
Georgine Darcy ... Miss Torso
Sara Berner ... Wife living above Thorwalds
Frank Cady ... Husband living above Thorwalds
Jesslyn Fax ... Sculpting neighbor with hearing aid
Rand Harper ... Newlywed man
Irene Winston ... Mrs. Anna Thorwald
Havis Davenport ... Newlywed woman
Marla English ... Girl at songwriter's party
more
Create a character page for: ?

Additional Details

Also Known As:
Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window (USA) (complete title)
more
Runtime:
112 min
Country:
USA
Language:
English
Colour:
Colour (Eastmancolor) (negative) | Colour (Technicolor) (prints)
Aspect Ratio:
1.66 : 1 more
Sound Mix:
Mono (Western Electric Recording)
Certification:
USA:PG (re-rating) (1983) (cerfiticate no. 27069) | Canada:A (Nova Scotia) (1983) | Canada:G (Quebec) (1983) | Canada:PG (Manitoba/Ontario) | USA:Approved (PCA #16938) | Portugal:M/12 | Spain:T | Iceland:L | Germany:12 | West Germany:16 (f) | Brazil:12 | Sweden:11 (re-rating) (1984) | Sweden:15 (original rating) (1955) | New Zealand:PG | Italy:T | Argentina:13 | Australia:PG | Chile:14 | Finland:K-8 | France:U (2000 re-release) | Netherlands:AL | Norway:16 | South Korea:15 | UK:PG | Peru:14 | Singapore:PG

Fun Stuff

Trivia:
Joe Flynn was cast in the movie, but his scene was cut. more
Goofs:
Continuity: Lisa takes the binoculars away from Jeff and wraps the neck cord around them before putting them on a small cupboard. When Jeff picks up the binoculars later, the neck cord is no longer wrapped around them. more
Quotes:
[first lines]
Voice on radio: Men, are you over 40? When you wake up in the morning, do you feel tired and rundown? Do you have that listless feeling...
[the camera pans around the courtyard; cut to later in the day]
Jeff: [answering phone] Jefferies.
Gunnison: Congratulations, Jeff!
Jeff: For what?
Gunnison: For getting rid of that cast!
Jeff: Who said I was getting rid of it?
Gunnison: This is Wednesday; seven weeks from the day you broke your leg. Yes or no?
Jeff: Gunnison, how did you ever get to be such a big editor with such a small memory?
[...]
more
Movie Connections:
Referenced in "Evening Shade: Rear Window (#2.11)" (1991) more
Soundtrack:
Excerpt from 'Fancy Free' more

FAQ

What did the little dog dig up in the garden?
Where is Hitchcock's cameo in "Rear Window"?
A Note Regarding Spoilers
more
62 out of 94 people found the following comment useful.
Excellent. Sharp, clever, funny, inventive, with great values all round., 12 November 2002
Author: Aidan McGuinness from Dublin, Ireland

Ah it's a movie that's in IMDB's Top 20, and it has good reason to be. For starter's let's look at the simple premise - James Stewart is L. B. Jeffries, a photographer who is currently recovering from an injury on assignment. With his broken leg he's stuck in his apartment, with nothing better to do than spy on his neighbours and be visited by his girlfriend, Lisa Carol Fremont (Grace Kelly), his officer friend Wendell, and his nurse, Stella. Jeffries observes the coming and goings of the various apartments he can observe (from his rear apartment window) and it is one of these - a Raymond Burr - who draws his attention because. could it be that the man has committed some heinous crime? Let's find out.

One of the beautiful things about the movie is its superb use of location. The whole movie, bar a couple of brief scenes, is set in the apartment. This would seem claustrophobic but Hitchcock never inhibits us like this - he lets us escape through Jeffries binoculars and camera lenses, and his roving camera swoops down to let us see what the characters see (but never, thankfully, anything more than that - this is how you do suspense!). The set design is wonderful - the apartment is just the right size and is nicely laid out. However the real praise is for all the other apartments visible to Jeffries - an actual habitable set with multiple stories where characters can be observed only as they pass by their own windows (yeah, they don't care much for curtains). There's a sense of individuality gone in to each home, despite the fact we can only see barely elements of each. This is helped by a nice, differing range of characters inhabiting each and going about their daily lives - there's a mini soap-opera contained in the movie, all observed at a distance. Excellent stuff.

Acting? It's great here. There's some nice depth to the characters here, with them feeling like actual real people rather than slick one-dimensional tags. Stewart is very proficient in this type of role - he was born to it - and Kelly proves she is more than just a pretty face, managing to effuse her character with both grace (*groan*) and steel. Even supporting characters like Stella are good (she has a wickedly black sense of thinking that's hilarious). What's so incredible is that the characters we observe from a distance in the other apartments (and with whom we never actually interact with) have as much depth as most main characters in movies nowadays. Excellent script and acting in this movie.

I've already praised Hitchcock's set location and camera work, so I won't prattle on about him much more. He does a stellar job here and, in my opinion, this is the best piece of work he's done (that I've seen). It's virtually flawless and you're never let down (or bored). Well done. It's a shame he lost out on an Oscar (although he did have tough competition that year with `On the Waterfront').

`Rear Window' is a great example of how you can successfully have sharp acting, script, and directing and not feel the need for a slew of swear words and gratuitous violence. Regarded as a classic, and deservedly so. 9.1/10

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Boring beginning bert_stevie
Grace Kelly hyperchipper
Never did understand this scene... homesick251960
Best movies of the 50s oneplussixi
Why .... Scorsesefellow
How did Thorwald know Jeff's number? Ximmerlaik
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