Eye spy

>> Hitchcock's voyeurism is in full view in Rear Window

by MATTHEW HAYS

Of all of Hitchcock's films, Rear Window is most indicative of his major obsessions. There's murder, dismemberment, plenty of female rear ends and, most importantly, voyeurism.

Rear Window, of course, is the story of a photographer (Jimmy Stewart) who's temporarily wheelchair-bound due to an accident which leaves him wearing a leg cast up to his hip. Stuck in his apartment during a drippingly hot summer, Stewart is beholden to his fashion-editor girlfriend (Grace Kelly) and maid (Thelma Ritter). Having nothing to do but gaze out at his motley crew of neighbours, Stewart soon finds himself obsessed with one man (Raymond Burr) who Stewart is convinced murdered his wife--who has mysteriously vanished. Though Ritter and Kelly first dismiss Stewart's speculation as paranoia, they soon get drawn into the conspiracy theory. But how to prove it?

As with two of his later masterworks, Vertigo and Psycho, Hitch consciously nudges his audience, reminding them that they, like Stewart and co., are getting cheap thrills while watching other people from a distance. Stewart, with an ever-stiff phallic cast stuck before him throughout the film, gazes at a scantily clad woman in the window across the way (along with others, this scene led one critic to denounce Hitch for his "anal fixation"). At one point, before her conversion, Kelly reprimands Stewart for his voyeurism, saying it's "like an illness," a clear reference to scopophilia, the psychiatric term for peeping toms.

Hitch's casting is typically impressive. The director clearly had fun setting Stewart against type--as he would in '58 with Vertigo--by having him play an ostensibly straightforward fellow with a dark underside, his voyeuristic fetish. And one can understand why Hitch chose Grace Kelly; decked out in legendary film costume designer Edith Head's frocks she is one of the most elegant people ever to grace the big screen.

While operating as a metaphor for moviegoing itself, Rear Window never neglects its duty as a suspense film either. In a neat combination of dramatic tension and self-referentialism, during the final confrontation between Stewart and Burr, our hero uses his camera as a defense. It's a perfect final touch, for this restoration of a perfect movie.

The restored print of Rear Window opens this Friday, March 17 at the Cinéma du Parc. See repertory listings for showtimes