Rear Window Filmoteca
By Kit Macdonald
Filmoteca's current Hitchcock season is a feast to dive into head first, and the chance to visit or revisit Rear Window on the big screen should be a priority for any film lover. First released in 1954, it is by common consent one of the master of suspense's most brilliant works, a deliberately claustrophobic and confined-feeling study of voyeurism, isolation, and the ethics of surveillance in which the audience ends up feeling as complicit as anyone.
James Stewart stars as L.B. "Jeff" Jefferies, a professional photographer convalescing from a broken leg in a wheelchair in his Greenwich Village apartment. He begins obsessively watching his neighbours through to pass the time, and eventually becomes convinced one of them has committed a murder. Grace Kelly co-stars as Jeff's girlfriend Lisa, who gets deeply involved in Jeff's investigation after initially dismissing his suspicions. Watch out for Hitchcock himself winding a clock in his traditional cameo appearance.