Rear Window Voyeurism

One of the most crucial elements of Rear Window, and a very clever tactic used by Hitchcock, is realism. In other words, most if not all things that happen in this film, and everything that every character feels and emotes, is entirely plausible in real life - perhaps not witnessing a murder, but something equally shocking, such as spousal abuse is entirely possible. Because of this there is at least one thing or person that everybody can identify with, either with Jeff, Lisa, the neighbours, or any of the events that take place over the course of the film (i.e. a date gone bad, a pet run over, love, heartbreak, etc.). However, the audience identifies most with Jefferies, played by Jimmy Stewart. This was achieved through a wealth of POV and
By allowing us to see what Jeff sees and to see how he reacts with what he is seeing, the audience gets a clear understanding of how he feels, and we are led to feel the same way. The theme of voyeurism plays one of the biggest parts in the film, and is the key to having an audience identify with what they see in this film. Because of this voyeurism, we are not only privy to Jefferies ' life, but also the lives of his neighbours. Each of these neighbours has yet another life that we pry into using Jefferies ' as our instrument, and each fit into a separate group of people with which any corresponding member of the audience can relate to (i.e. the young girls can identify with Miss Torso, the single middle-aged women with Miss Lonelyhearts, etc.). Rear Window is a film with a plethora of characters with which the audience can identify with, connecting with either their personalities or their experiences; we 'play the part ' of all of the main characters, and practically every one of the neighbours in the complex, through the ingenious voyeurism throughout the