A Comparison Of Rear Window And Shadow Of A Doubt

There are two Hitchcock films that are similar in contrast which are “Rear Window” and “Shadow of a Doubt”. Something that I enjoy the most about these two films are the action. They both share the same mystery and action. For example in “Rear Window” the main character Jeff was a journalist, during some picture taking he broke his leg. He was in a cast the whole movie, the only thing he did was sit in his wheelchair and look out the window at his neighbors. Just about all of the characters were viewed from a distance, but three. These three are Jeff who is the main character, his girlfriend Lisa, and Mr. Thorwald.
Action came into play when Mr. Thorwald started getting suspicious. Him and his wife were always fighting and one day things got physical, and a possible murder of his wife. Action is very important in this film because with Jeff being in a cast, not doing anything the movie would be boring without action.  In the beginning of the movie there wasn’t any violence his day’s were just working with the nurse and looking out at

his neighbors. Later on in the movie that’s where all the action happened and the movie got a lot better. Once Jeff saw Mr. Thorwald get physical with his wife all the suspense started happening and it was all action.
Other than the action with Mr. Thorwald, this movie was pretty calm. There was no chases or gun battles, just Jeff in his wheelchair watching the neighbors. There was scene at the end of the movie where Mr. Thorwald broke into Jeffries house and tried to kill him, Jeff ended up falling out of his window and breaking his other leg.
There are some close-ups in the film like when Jeff was looking out in his binoculars at his neighbors; this shows all the characters emotions and their everyday lifestyle. For example one woman nicknamed “Miss Torso” who is a dancer that gets up every morning and practices dancing while she starts her day. There’s another couple who live above the Thorwald’s who every morning put their dog in a basket and lower it down onto the ground and let him run around. There’s a woman nicknamed Miss Lonelyhearts who never has company and has “dinner dates” with herself. This movie was expanded into three days, there was the transition of day to night that showed what the night was like for Jeff and his neighbor’s. Some people getting ready for bed, the Thorwalds fighting, and some people partying the night away.
The Action in this movie did change the moods of characters especially Jeff. As soon as he saw Mr. Thorwald get physical and possibly kill his wife, Jeff became obsessed with him. Sometime Jefferies would stay up all night to spy on his suspicious neighbor. He would watch his neighbor leave in the middle of the night and come back home early in the morning, that was the only time that Mr. Thorwald would leave his house.
The other film that has is similar to “Rear Window” is another Hitchcock movie “Shadow of a Doubt”.

This film has a lot more action than the other one. This movie is about Uncle Charlie, who is a killer that escaped from detectives and ran to his sister’s house far away. When Uncle Charlie arrived to the house his sister and her family came to greet him and take him home. Charlie’s sister’s family consists of her, her husband, her two daughters, and her son. One of her daughters was named Charlie after her brother. Little Charlie is very important in the action aspect of this movie. Detectives found Uncle Charlie hiding and told little Charlie about the murders that her uncle committed. She was shocked and didn’t believe them at first, but after going to the local library and reading newspapers about it she started to believe the detectives. The next day they told Charlie to get Charlie out of town so that they could arrest

him.
There was a lot of chasing during this film with the detectives trying to catch Charlie. There was murders in the movie, but they all happened before the movie and they weren’t seen on screen. There was some violence when Uncle Charlie tried to kill his niece when she started to figure out that he was the killer. He tried to get her to fall to her death and trapping her in a garage with the car on. No one but little Charlie would have thought that Uncle Charlie tried to kill her, everyone all thought that Uncle Charlie was a wonderful person.
Close-ups are really important to this movie because there is so much emotion. For example when little Charlie found out that her uncle was a killer, the director zoomed the camera out making her seem small. This shows that little Charlie felt small in the world and depressed. Another example was towards the end of the movie Uncle Charlie gave a speech.During his speech the camera zoomed in on his face showing that he was guilty of the murders, there was also fear, regret and anxiousness on his face.
The action in this movie shows the changes in mood in the characters. This was also like the close-ups, it was showing the mood changes from worried to sad, and anger to fear. A majority of the mood changes were from Uncle and little Charlie. The movie was more focused on these two characters so no one noticed any other mood changes in anyone else.
These two films have the same kind of action, but they are both very different in so many ways.