Alfred Hitchcock's "Rear Window" (1954)

Using the method I mentioned earlier of the three different perspectives, I will write my observations of the Alfred Hitchcock's thriller film Rear Window (1954).

Stylistic Perspective

• Themes: looking and gazing
• Jeff watching the actions of his neighbours, each one with a different story 
• Hitchcock shows another idea of a movie (each neighbour's window tells a different story and thus a different movie)
• Jeff watches in horror as Thorwald catches Lisa snooping around his apartment.
• Thorwald notices Lisa with the ring and his gaze turns to the camera (*gasp*)
• Always through Jeff's point of view for the entire film, except a shot at the end of Jeff falling from his apartment window - subjective camera.
• The idea of who the real victim is - Thorwald's wife, Mrs. Lonely Heart, and even Jeff

Perspective of Intent

• Creating a thriller of a murder that elicits fear without actually showing the actions of the murder.
• Subjective camera showing only Jeff's perspective causes the audience to be blind to certain information. This adds a greater amount of suspense.

Enjoyment Perspective

• A very good film. Without a doubt, the audience feels fear for Lisa's life when she is caught by Thorwald and then for Jeff when Thorwald is throwing him out of Jeff's apartment window.
• Grace Kelly is of course very beautiful, but at the same time she takes on part of the heroic role by entering Thorwald's apartment and looking for evidence that he murdered his wife.

Multiple Perspectives

After watching a film, the most common response when telling a friend about it is four things:

1)    Was the film good or bad?

2)    Who were the actors in the film?

3)    What was the plot?

4)    A specific part of the film that justifies why the film was good or bad.

In most cases, movies are judged by the enjoyment created by the fictional characters and the story. After a while, individuals get use to particular genres of film and will only watch movies that fit that category.

My favorite genres include romantic comedies, documentaries, classics, and action. Personally, I don't usually care for horror or western films. Horror films seem to elicit way too much fear and leave me overly sensitize to things in my environment, while western films seem slow and seem uninteresting in the many shots of scenery or the protagonist riding off in the sunset. Now, however, I look at films from three different perspectives that help me to better appreciate the film separate from the genre it is placed in. 

There is the stylistic perspective: themes behind the plot, certain choices made by the director to better enrich the storyline, camera angles and techniques that perhaps aid in character enhancement, and how the actors themselves project their character. It's the little details that you don't really notice unless you might be intentionally looking for it. For example the lighting in one scene might be different than another, to emphasize the lightness of the mood of the characters or give a more angelic feel to the surrounding. While a darker light might indicate something mysterious to come, perhaps the mood appears heavier and uneasy.

The perspective of intent: what was the reason for making the film, whether to tell a narrative or elicit an emotional response from the audience? Did the film complete its intent therefore the audience could better understand what the director was getting at? If the director's goal was to bring awareness to a particular issue in a documentary, was there enough evidence to show that every individual needs to do his or her part for the greater good? It's not to say that every film has a noble intention of global concerns, but could be simply to bring about laughter and a feeling of happiness when watching the film.

And finally the enjoyment perspective: how pleasing were the images? Were the characters relatable? Did the film elicit any emotional response and was appropriate to the actions of the characters? Did the plot make sense and have a satisfactory conclusion? Sometimes this perspective gets more attention overall than the other two, because there might be times where people just want to know if it is worth taking two hours of their time to watch a film. If not, then the other two perspectives cannot really come into play. 

Beeban Kidron: The Shared Wonder of Film (Ted Talk)

This video is interesting for a number of reasons. A few of the films shown in this short video, I have seen during class: Triumph of the Will (1935), Citizen Kane (1941), and Rear Window (1954). The idea given by director, Beeban Kidron, is to bring this “shared narrative” of film to the youth of UK in hopes of stimulating discussion about worldviews. Kidron considers the youth as beginning to become more involved in the world, but have no idea what has happened in the past. Through film, they can be educated but as well there is an enjoyment factor that will produce creative investigation and better their outlook on being involved in the process.

Film As A Mass Medium

I took a course over the summer, Introduction to Film as a Mass Medium, which broadened my opinions of films and the various aspects of film as a mass medium. We looked at how films became popularized, the difference between active and passive viewing, the production of genres, and this idea of a collected audience known as the “masses.” In the course we watched films and made observations based on the lighting, camera angle, or even the character’s interactions with each other. Because of this, I became immersed in the film’s diegesis as well as the way it grabbed the viewer’s attention and brought them closer to the fictional characters—physically and emotionally.

I used to watch films just because they were a social part of my life - movie night with the family or going to the theatre with friends. It was not something I thought too much about, but just what I did as a pastime. After watching a movie, I would mostly consider whether it was either a good or a bad movie and if I would recommend it to others or perhaps wanted to re-watch it. This resulted in a very narrow view of the purpose of film and why it has played a significant role in society’s structure. Why does society make such a big deal over film, if common individuals only passively watch films for the sole purpose of enjoyment? The cinema is seen as the most useful method of eliciting emotion to thousands of individuals at the same moment. This collective thinking brings people together.

It’s why currently actors, actresses, and the idea of celebrities have become such a highly paid and idolized status. The director, the actors, the editors and so on, created this imaginative realm that the audience is allowed in for the span of the movie. At the same time, it represents the artistic talents of the entire filmmaking process and the director’s vision for the film. This vision, along with its characterization into a particular genre, then is superimposed onto the viewer’s subconscious of what makes films good or bad.