In this classic Alfred Hitchcock film, the master of suspense is in top form. Hitchcock always hated shooting on location, much preferring the confines of a studio where his obsessive attention to detail would not be interefered with by things like weather. In this film, his sometimes claustrophobic manner of shooting was taken to its logical end: there is only one set, that being the single room inhabited by James Stewart's wheelchair-bound photographer and everything he could see out his rear window. With smooth camera movements and perfect editing, Hitchcock was able to make the scenes look as sprawling or as intimate as he wanted. The use of a tiny set to create suspense was also a feature of his earlier 1948 film Rope, which I also saw for the first time recently.

Stewart plays L. B. Jeffries, a photographer who is stuck in his apartment while his broken leg heals. He is visited by his nurse Stella, played by a wisecracking Thelma Ritter (who was nominated for six Best Supporting Actress awards for playing roles just like this), and his high-society girlfriend Lisa Fremont, played by a stunning Grace Kelly. This is as close to hell as Jeffries has ever been. He is a rugged individualist who puts his life in danger to get the perfect photograph, and he would rather be anywhere than stuck in his apartment. His natural curiosity leads him to spend his time peering out the back window into the lives of the people in the buildings behind his. Ritter berates him for being a peeping tom and for sleeping in his chair all the time, while Kelly wants him to marry her and settle down as a fashion photographer.

His neighbors are a mixed bag, all of whom start to look suspicious as the film rolls on. There is Miss Lonelyhearts, a depressed woman who has dinner parties for imagined gentleman callers. There is a pair of newlyweds given to marathon lovemaking. There is a young man who plays the piano beautifully but is harrassed by his teacher (Hitchcock in one of his signature cameos). Finally, there are the Thorwalds, a couple played by Raymond Burr and Irene Winston. He is a salesman who takes care of his invalid wife, who happens to be an alcoholic harpy. One day, a series of events convince Stewart that Burr has murdered his wife and disposed of her body. The problem is, nobody believes him: not his girlfriend, who has other things on her mind; not his nurse, who thinks he was hallucinating or half-asleep; and not his friend Lieutenant Doyle (Wendell Corey), who thinks he has an overactive imagination. Out of their affection for Jeffries, everyone hesitatingly begins to help him investigate a murder that may or may not have happened.

The script is full of crackling exchanges among all the characters. There are no poorly-written parts, since there are only really four speaking roles of any substance. Ritter has many of the best lines, as she lays down a hilarious mix of folk wisdom and smartass comments. The interaction between Kelly and Stewart is especially wonderful; screenwriter John Michael Hayes, who also wrote Hitchcock's To Catch a Thief, The Trouble with Harry, and The Man Who Knew Too Much, had a ball with their relationship, which consists of Stewart attempting to sound crotchety and off-putting to a woman that he in fact loves very much. Watch the scene where he attempts to break up with her and she leaves in anger.

What the film is "about" (I hate saying that) is our society's voyeuristic nature. We sit around and are passively entertained, watching movies, "reality" television shows, and sporting events. Much of the dialog is so intentionally directed at the audience that it must have been hard for the actors to keep from turning toward the camera and smirking. For example, Ritter says at one point, "We've become a race of Peeping Toms. What people ought to do is get outside their own house and look in for a change. Yes sir. How's that for a bit of homespun philosophy?" We are made accomplices to Jeffries' peeping, with many of the camera angles originating from just over his shoulder. Hitchcock was a master of making the viewer uncomfortable with what becomes, indirectly, a passive role in the events taking place. Kelly's most insightful line is one that applies to every viewer of the film: "Jeff, you know if someone came in here, they wouldn't believe what they'd see? You and me with long faces plunged into despair because we find out a man didn't kill his wife. We're two of the most frightening ghouls I've ever known." And that's not even giving away the ending. This is a stellar film, consistently ranked as one of the best of all time, including #14 on the Internet Movie Database's top 250 films, as well as #42 on the American Film Institute's controversial "100 Years, 100 Movies" list.