Rear Window The hero of Alfred Hitchcock's murder mystery Rear Window is trapped in a wheelchair, and the viewer is trapped, too. The view is trapped inside L.B Jefferies point of view inside building due to his lack of freedom and his limited options. He passes his long days and nights by shamelessly keeping a watch on his neighbors, the audience must share his obsession. It's wrong, we know, but what if L.B Jefferies witnesses vulgar activity going on across the way. Jefferies and Lisa’s relationship seems to be based on attraction. Hitchcock illustrates that both men and women are capable to adapting to a new lifestyle by using L.B Jefferies and Lisa relationship. Lisa later in the film adapts to Jefferies fast paced, adventurous lifestyle
As the story begins, the character of the husband has a negative personality. He lacks compassion, is narrow-minded, and is jealous of his wife’s friendship with a blind man named Robert. His constantly complains that “a blind man in my house was not something [he looked] forward to” (362). The close outside friendship between the narrator’s wife and Robert provokes his insecurities. This friendship has lasted for ten years and during those years, they have exchanged countless tapes regarding experiences they have gone through. Because of this, her husband feels “she [has] told him everything or it so it seemed” (363) about their relationship.
Life is not something simple as we often prefer. There are many different approaches and in most instances we will not find the desired fulfillment in any of them. In the short story “Parkers Back” written by Flannery O’Connor we have a multi-faceted view into the life of the primary character O.E. Parker. In addition we see into the life of Sarah Ruth, Parker’s wife and possibly into the life of author Flannery O’Connor, who died shortly after completing this short story. The characters in this story deal with Tattoos from totally different perspectives and get completely different results. Tattoos are the focal point of the story and prominent on many occasions. Without purpose in life people often make bad decisions which impact the rest of their lives and those they interact with. How often do we pretend to be something or somebody we are not, and have to live with the unpleasant results?
Paula Vogel’s play, How I Learned to Drive, artistically tackles the disturbing issue of incestual pedophilia. The play’s protagonist Li’l Bit narrates the action as she goes through her memory of specific events. Much like stream of consciousness, her narration does not lead chronologically to scenes in her past. Rather it jumps back and forth between the present and different points in her life. She tells of her memories of youth and her sexual and emotional relationship with her Uncle Peck. Rather than simply telling about her experiences, though, Li’l Bit shares her memories through vignettes which show the audience her role in the affair within the context of learning to drive (Greene 425).
In the film Rear Window directed by Alfred Hitchcock, a significant shift of power is portrayed. This shift occurs between the protagonist of the film, L.B Jeffries and his romantic partner, Lisa Freemont. This shift also aids in outlining the main theme of the film, which is marriage, as all aspects of marriage are observed and taken into account by Jeffries. The change of dominance within Lisa and Jeffries relationship can be broken down into three stages, which develop and change throughout the film. At the beginning of the film Jeffries is shown to have the power within the relationship as he dictates the parameters of the relationship, however he is also intimidated by Lisa 's social standing. Towards the middle of the film the possession
The narrator finally achieves an authoritative position in her marriage, with John unconscious and her creative imagination finally free of all restraints. Her continual “creeping” over his prone body serves as a repeated emphasis of this liberation, almost as if the narrator chooses to climb over him to highlight his inferiority over and over again” (Harrison). John was a weak person, Jane suffered from a nervous disorder which was made way worse by the feelings of being trapped in a room. The setting of the nursery room with barred windows in a colonial mansion provides an image of the loneliness and seclusion she experienced. Periods of time can lead to insanity. Maybe her illness wasn’t that bad but he made it worse on her part because he was a sick husband. Some critics have argued “Is the narrator really liberated? We’re inclined towards saying “no”, given that she’s still creeping around the room and that her psyche is broken”
There are several parallels between Jeff’s relationship with Lisa and the scenarios he observes voyeuristically. These parallels are especially striking between Jeff, Lisa and the Thorwalds, but in this case we can observe that the gender roles are reversed. Mr. Thorwald and Lisa are always active and dominantly standing over their counterparts, while Mrs. Thorwald and Jeff are immobilized in one space and passive. When Mr. Thorwald brings his wife a rose, he shows a desire for a loving relationship, but Mrs. Thorwald laughs at him. Lisa, on the other hand, isn’t even able to get Jeff’s attention by smothering him with affection while sitting on his lap. Laura Mulvey argues in Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema that in virtually every visual
As a result, women were stuck at home, usually alone, until their husbands got home. In the story, Jane is at home staring at the wallpaper in her room. The wallpaper’s color is described by Jane as being “repellent, almost revolting” (3) and the pattern is “torturing” and “like a bad dream” (10). The description of the wallpaper represents Jane’s and all women’s thoughts about the ideologies and rules upheld by men prior to the First World War. It is made evident that this wallpaper represents the screen made up of men’s ideologies at the time caging in women. Jane is subconsciously repelled by this screen and represents her discovering continuously figuring out what she wants. Metaphorically, Jane is trapped in that room by a culture established by men. Furthermore, Jane compares the wallpaper’s pattern to bars putting further emphasis on her feelings of being trapped and helpless. Later in the narrative, she catches Jennie staring at the wallpaper’s pattern and then decides to study the pattern and determine what it means herself. Her study of the pattern is representative of her trying to analyze the situation in which she’s in. By studying the pattern, she progressively discovers herself, especially when she sees the woman behind the
Stam, Robert & Pearson, Robertson., ‘Hitchcock’s Rear Window: Refluxivity and the Critique of Voyeurism’ in Deutelbaum, Marshall & Poague, Leland A. ed., A Hitchcock Reader (John Wiley & Sons: 2009).
This left Hitchcock films as some of her mother’s favorites. Pemberton, went to a Hitchcock festival as an adult, this time watching Rear Window, which she had not seen since she was a child with an objective examination, she found a scene that would shift both her and her mother’s perspective of this movie. As Jimmy Stewart’s character, Jefferies, realizes he is in danger, telephones his friend Wendell Corey, who was not at home, but he spoke with the baby-sitter who did not appear on screen, but was portrayed in a voice that would convey imagery of a “familiar black image.” Asking the inspiration for this essay “Do he have your number, Mr.
The story introduced us to the narrator with him discussing how a blind man was coming to visit him and his wife. His wife and this blind man seemed to have a strong relationship considering they would send tapes back and forth to one another to keep in touch. The narrator was not keen on the idea of this blind man being company. “I wasn’t enthusiastic about his visit,” he states. In his defense, this reaction would seem normal coming from a husband whose wife is friendly with another man. Facknitz defends my statement by bringing up the time when the narrator’s wife had worked for the blind man and he let her touch his face (par. 17). The wife talking to the narrator says, “She told me he ran his fingers over every part of her face, her nose-even her neck! She never forgot it. She even tried to write a poem about it.” Facknitz mentions, “Clearly he is jealous, and so emphasizes the eroticism of the blind man’s touch,” (par. 18). Even though the narrator may not have many feelings toward people in his life, he suitably is upset with the extent of his wife and the blind man’s relationsh...
This mystery-bound-to-remain-a-mystery is exposed when the (voyeuristic) subject and the (fetishistic) object exchange places. At the story's close, the narrator is determined to "astonish" John. "I don't want to go out," she writes, "and I don't want to have anybody come in, till John comes. I want to astonish him" (Gilman 34). John comes home to find that she has "locked the door and thrown the key down into the front path" (Gilman 34).
Jeffries voyeurisms, and activities are established through his title as a photojournalist, a creator of stories and captor of image. However, his enforced inactivity, binding him to his seat as a spectator, puts him squarely in the phantasy position of the cinema audience ready to oversee the females in the movie that clearly are unable to notice that they are being watched.
Popular crime fiction has tended to maintain and challenge the traditional conventions of the established genre for its own contextual purpose. The generations holds Arthur Doyles’s “ The Hounds of Baskerville“ as one of the most endearing classics, revolving around the brilliant deductions of the enigmatic Sherlock Holmes, establishing a series of conventions that were to serve as a catalyst for future writers. In this sense, Alfred Hitchcock’s own “Rear Window” exhibits a more liberal, postmodern approach that embeds itself in the contemporary consciousness due to the manipulations of its key conventional concerns, particularly the sleuth hero and the clue puzzle. In doing so, both texts maintain the core reflections of their societal context they were written in
In his poem The Young Housewife, William Carlos Williams uses a series of images to capture a fleeting moment in time, an emotion of admiration and desire. As a man who has endured a few heartbreaks and regrets in life, I identified with the contrite and “solitary” speaker who watches a struggling woman whom he used to love (4). The poem’s main focus is this young woman; newly married, who was most likely involved with the speaker in the past. In the first stanza, Williams gives the reader a glimpse of the woman in "her husband's house" (3). His description is somewhat voyeuristic as he depicts the woman “at ten A.M. […] in negligee behind / the wooden walls,” but yet somehow he is still able to see her (1, 2-3). Whether he is literally seeing her move about the house in her undergarments or if it is just in his imagination is unknown to the reader. Although this seems purely lustful, I believe the speaker has more innocent feelings than are apparent. He sees her, the woman whom he once treasured and desired, living a mundane life with an ungrateful spouse. I can imagine that this would be quite difficult to watch. Having witnessed past sweethearts make imprudent decisions and live consequently unhappy lives, I know how it can be unsettling. The speaker “pass[es] solitary in [his] car,” feeling empathy for her, but unable to lend aid (4). This is a very relatable situation that most ex-lovers will face; a sense of distance and a resulting feeling of helplessness.
Through the masking of narrative, secret window exposes order and chaos. The use of mise en scene throughout the first scene of ‘Secret Window’ reveals a lot about the main character’s profession and life style. One is brought into the opening scene to learn that he is a writer/author depicted through the busy desk filled with a laptop and other books/journals around it. Secondly, we find the character placed and lying on a sofa instead of a bed which could possibly relate to his current state of mind which may have been affected by previously seeing a woman in bed with another man. The main use of mise en scene used in the opening few minutes of ‘Secret Window’ is when a stranger is seen at the door of the main character’s house. The stranger is wearing a black top hot which suggests that he may bring danger or harm that comes from his mind. By the use of the man wearing a black hat which dominates the majority of his head, it also applies the belief that ‘Secret Window’ is a psychological thriller. Throughout the film, one is under an illusion for the better part of it. Most of what someone hears and sees is through t...