Rear Window Sequence Analysis

Rear Window Sequence Analysis ：‘Lisa, what do you? Don’t go’

The sequence to be analyzed is selected from Rear Window (1954), and appears before the climax when the suspect Lars Thorwald (Raymond Burr) comes back and finds Lisa (Grace Kelly) hiding in his room. In this sequence, for proving their hypothesis about the ring, Lisa climbs up the window and reaches Thorwald’s house to find the marriage ring of Mrs. Thorwald. This plot is one of most tense parts of this film, and this is also the transition of the narrative of the film, from which Jeff (James Stewart) begins to be confronted with the murderer face to face. At the end of this sequence, Mr. Thorwald stepped into the house and we see the his shadow on the windowpine.

As the much of

film is shown from the perspective of Jeff, Jeff is the core spectator of the plot in this sequence. From the previous story, we know that Jeff and Lisa find that Mr. Thorwald is packaging his bag and planning to escape. In this case, they have to search powerful evidence quickly to identify he kills his wife. Therefore, Lisa and Stella volunteer to dig the garden to find knife at the midnight. After finding nothing in the flower garden with Stella, Lisa decides to look for the most significant evidence- the ring by herself without discussing with Jeff. In the narration of this sequence, as audiences we see the whole plot from the eyes of Jeff. In other words, to some degree, our reactions are placed in the film by means of the acting of James Stewart. When surprised by Lisa climbing the staircase, Jeff says:’ Lisa, what do you? Don’t!’ just like we audience outside the screen would like to do. He is forced to look on as Lisa steps into danger hopelessly. In this sequence, the close-ups of Jeff show us the tense and anxiety from him, and then the long shots continually tells us the situation of Lisa. We can easily imagine how desperate and hopeless Jeff is when he sees the girl he loves in danger but he can do nothing. Jeff, although some feminist film criticism described him as an active viewer, in fact he is in a negative position in the whole film with staying his wheelchair by contrast of the freedom of Lisa. As a matter of fact, he can do nothing except for watching like an audience. In this way, by placing the charming girl who is beloved by Jeff and audiences in danger, the director builds the tense atmosphere and develops the plot.
Lisa, starred by Grace Kelly, is the symbol of elegance and beauty in the eyes of most film audiences. In this sequence, in the window frame, we can see her graceful movements even she is climbing high windows and doing something dangerous. She wears a premium print dress and very high heels on in this sequence. We can find Hitchcock is a director who pays great attention to details. The costumes here are so creative that in the true world we cannot imagine a pretty girl with print dress and heels would climb the window. She seems so vulnerable and feminine with the costumes. In this way, the great contrast between the costumes and the plots contributes to a “dramatic purpose” in this film as the director hopes. On the other hand, we all do not hope to see quite a beautiful woman is in danger so therefore we are more nervous in this way. We witness that Lisa moves elegantly with the swing of long length skirt like a dancer. The camera tilts upwards and follows her movement and at the same time the frame movements enable us to look clearly. Lisa jumps into the house successfully. Then, the camera pans right and follows the movements of Lisa with the cuts of continuity employed to present what Jeff is doing. From the close up shots, we see that he is so worrying about Lisa and then take his professional camera to observe the situation of her. By this means, also from the perspective of Jeff, but changing the window frame to the circular lens frame, the long shot transits to medium shot naturally and show us the clear and excited expression of Lisa when she finds the bag of Mrs. Thorwald. However, there is not a wedding ring in this bag. Mr. Thorwald will come back soon and Jeff is so nervous that he says “come on, come on, get out there”. In the meanwhile, Jeff puts down his camera, and thus the frame changes back to rectangular frame, and after a long shot of Lisa. With a fast paced cut to the apartment of Jeff, at the present time Stella comes back and tells Jeff give her more time to find the evidence.
Even though under this tense circumstance, the sound music in this sequence is still peaceful piano tunes from the musician’s room.

When Lisa is finding the ring in the room, the camera tilts down and Stella finds that “Miss. Lonely heart” wants to kill herself. But luckily, she stops by the beautiful music outside and reaches to window to hear. The music here is the significant part of plot. Miss. Lonely stops by the music from the song writer and in the following story, she falls love with him and has a happy ending. In this sequence, the director does not employ a traditional sound with fast beats to support the dramatic scenes. The skillful and creative use of sound produces a strong and dramatic contrast here.

At the same time, when Mr. Lonely appreciates the music by the window, the extreme long shot shows us that Lisa is standing by the window too, and the murderer appears on the screen now. Jeff and Stella are extremely stressful when they witness the situation. Soon Lisa hears Mr. Thorwald opening the door and hides herself. At the end of sequence, the shadow of Mr. Thorwald reflects on the window. We cannot see the real expressions but only a blurry reflection, which deepens our uncertainty and

fear.
In this sequence, we feel the fear from the plots and the outstanding acting of actors. The close-ups of Jeff continually show us the expressions of him. As the much of the film, Jeff is confined to his wheelchair in this sequence, so the actor has to take advantage of his expressions to show his anxiety about the girl he loves. This is a challenge because it is easy to be dull when his expressions are similar and repeated. In this sequence, audiences can easily feel the love from Jeff because he is so helpless and nervous when he sees Lisa in danger. However, at the start of the film, he is so unwilling to marry her and find a seemingly absurd reason– just because she is too perfect. At first, it is difficult to receive by audiences and thus the director arouses our strong hope for their relationship. As the development of plots, at the beginning of film, Lisa always wears perfect dress with perfect makeup, which sometimes draws all of our attractions of her appearances. But as the plots develop, she shows Jeff some different characters he never finds before. She quickly trusts Jeff about his theory of the murder even though the detector friend is still skeptical. She is clever and brave when she volunteers to find the evidence. In this sequence taken from the film, she wears beautiful dress but bravely climbs the high staircase just for finding the truth to support the theory of Jeff. At the end of film, she wears casual jeans that presumably Jeff’s type lying on the bed of Jeff, which symbols the happy ending of this couple.
As for the negative attitude towards marriage of Jeff, this can be a hint for the whole film.

In this film, compared with Jeff, who is confined to wheelchair, Lisa is able to move freely. By contrast, Mr. Thorwald has to take care of his wife who is ill in bed. This interesting and joking comparison provokes our thinking about marriage. Presumably, at first, the murderer and his wife loves each other, but the marriage ends up with a dreadful murder. Rear window is defined as a thriller movie but also a love story. Throughout the movie, the lonely lady and the song writer, the sexy dancer and her soldier boyfriend, all of these subplots are talking about the love and marriage with the narrative of a thrilling murder event. In this sequence, Lisa takes risks to find the wedding ring, which symbolizes the marriage, but now it is the symbol of a cruel crime. Even though at the end of film it is a traditional Hollywood’s happy ending for the couples, we still would like to question the meaning of

marriage.