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Alfred Hitchcock Opening Scene Analysis

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The theme of voyeurism subtly reveals itself to the audience as early on as the opening scene of the movie. Whilst the credits roll, the movie greets the audience with a still show out of a three pane window covered in blinds, which addresses the rule of thirds used commonly in architecture. The blinds rise slowly, like the opening to a stage production, preparing the audience for the spectacle they are about to witness. By no accident, the windows are also the same proportions of the size of the frame, further emphasizing the relationship between the spectator and the main character. The camera slowly approaches the window until it embraces the space of the whole screen and escapes the apartment through the open window. The choreography of this simple scene mimics the movements of a real human, as if we are present in …show more content…

It is a moment of complete integration with the main character and therefore a merging of our gaze with Jeff’s. The spectator has now become half camera – half man. Steven Jacobs likes the architecture of the set to a giant camera obscura, which becomes ‘an instrument of the gaze … on an urban scale.’

After the blinds rise in the first scene, it appears that one is looking out towards the apartments of Jeff’s neighbours living across from him. The camera does a counter clockwise sweep across the courtyard. Hitchcock is trying to give the audience an overall view of the set so they can familiarise themselves with the architectural space early on in the film. A black cat is shown running across the patio, which may represent bad luck to come for those who are susperstitious. Snippets of the daily activities of the neighbours who come to arrest Jeff’s attention throughout the movie are shown. The eclectic and diverse ranges of characters

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Similar ideas, suggest on Lisa’s behaviour, at the beginning of the film, she also shown a strong disagreement on Jeff’s action’s towards spying his neighbourhood but because she loves Jeff’s so much Lisa try to look deeper and understatement about him “were the most frightening ghouls I ever seen” -Lisa. This quote illustrates on how Lisa thinks what is the implications of Jeff’s actions. As she think that their voyeuristic behaviour through that rear window alludes that they’re doing wrong but Hitchcock’s wants to show the other side and part of it. Starting of the scene every observation of Jeff’s authors on Thorwarld’s apartment starting to connect and showed evidence that proves he killed his own wife. He also shows a strong agreement that through this unwary and curiosity of the protagonist in the film resulted in many positive conclusions.

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