Don’t miss Rear Window by Alfred Hitchcock this Sunday on Arte

The director signs a timeless cinema metaphor in this classic released in 1954.

While France Télévisions is currently devoting a cycle to Alfred HitchcockArte is also honoring the English director this Sunday evening with Rear window (1954), one of his most famous films, which will celebrate its 70th anniversary this year.

France TV opens 2024 with a generous Hitchcock cycle

The story of Rear window ? Because of a broken leg, a photo reporter, played by James Stewart, is immobilized at home. To keep himself busy, he stays behind a pair of binoculars which he focuses on the building opposite his and watches his neighbors go about their business. Until the day he becomes certain that one of them has just committed a crime. He then convinces his fiancée, played by the voluptuous Grace Kelly, to help him prove it…

Here the spectator is constantly separated from the suspense by a glass and yet, he stamps his feet. Rear window is one of the first behind closed doors in cinema. Alfred Hitchcock constructs meticulous shots by connecting them in a natural way, just as he did in The rope. It is therefore the numerous windows of the building which allow it to connect the different scenes. Even if the story is focused on the daily life of the American middle class and therefore less frightening than a Psychosis or one Vertigothis film is a classic not to be missed.

Hitchcock achieves a technical tour de force; James Stewart, immobilized and in pajamas, is convincing and as attractive as ever and, as numerous analyzes demonstrate, this film can even be perceived as a metaphor for cinema. The character of James Stewart represents the audience and the building he is looking at with his tenants, the film. Rear window is therefore the story of an art that looks at itself, of a spectator looking at another spectator. A story of voyeurs in short.