RESEARCH : Rear Window

When doing research into Voyeurism, no project would be concise unless it involved watching Alfred Hitchcocks Rear Window. I recently managed to watch the entire film al the way through and I am amazed by how it has affected me.

The film tells the story of a photographer who is house bound after breaking his leg whilst photographing a motor racing acident. While in his apartment, he spends the days looking out of his window and into those of his neighbours.

As he has watched them for a while, he names each of the 'characters' that he watches and becomes familiar with their daily routines.

The film itself is superbly shot, each frame and camera pan is awesome. The hesitation in the camera pans when looking into one of the neighbours apartments is almost life-like.

What has really gotten to me is the way that JamesfStewarts' character 'LB "Jeff" Jefferies' starts to care about his neighbours. I have an inward facing window in the student accomodation that I live in. This allows me to see into the carpark and into the windows of the surrounding rooms. It is almost exactly like the setup of Rear Window.

I have always kept my curtain open so that I can see whats going on outside rather than being able to glance up from my monitor to see a green curtain. Previously I just enjoyed seeing the movements of others out of the corner of my eye. It was a welcome distraction, reminding me that I wasnt the only one up a stupid hour of the night/morning.

Since watching Rear Window I have started to give names to the people I regularly see. I have even started to care about what is happening with some of them. One group of characters [The beauty queens - as they always seem to be touching up their hair or makeup!] didnt seem to be in for a few days. There lights where always off at night and the curtains didnt move, then when they did they stayed shut for another few days and I was almost releived when the curtains had opened, lights where on and life could be seen.

This is something that I wish to experiment with further within the later stages of this project. I think that we will always build a certain attachment to those who we see everyday, but that we might not realise it until they are no longer there.