Reviews

"What we have here is failure to communicate"

So says the captain about the inmate called "Cool Hand Luke" in the film of the same name. In the movie, Paul Newman plays a man who lives in a small town. He personifies the very individualistic mindset.

Having nothing to do and no friends, Luke (Newman) decides to do a little drinking while cutting the heads off of parking meters. When confronted by the police, Luke acts like he is drunk (either he is actually acting or he actually is drunk) and finds his way into prison .Once in prison, Luke joins a chain gang. All goes well and, despite a rough start, the inmates begin to like him. He even makes a friend in the form of Dragline, an illiterate man played by George Kennedy. Luke is just about to get out of the prison. Then fate deals him a bad hand.

Luke learns about his mother's death. In his sorrow, Luke breaks out of prison, only to be caught. He escapes again, only to be caught and beaten. Then, he takes a prison truck and escapes along with Dragline, only to be shot by a very accurate prison guard.

This film comments on society's treatment of the individual. In the beginning of the film, Luke's attitude equals the epitome of self sufficiency. He is a loner who considers rules and regulations, as he puts it in the scene with the famous "Night in the Box" speech, "nothin' worth listenin' to." As he lives on in the prison, his attitude of I don't need you frustrates the prison officials who try to get his "mind right" repeatedly. They take their dismay, and persist in doing this despite it's lack of effectiveness, to the point that they beat Luke. Luke fights them at every turn. They lie and beat him, showing this most sadistically in a scene where they tell Luke to get his dirt out of the captain's ditch. They make him get the dirt out, then complain about the unavoidable effect of having that dirt on the lawn when he is done. He has to put the dirt back in. Right after that, he is forced to take the dirt back out again. This cycle continues until Luke reaches the point where he lashes out in frustration, only to be beaten to the point where he falls into the ditch. He comes back out, wrapping his arms around the nearest guard, crying about how his mind is now right.

Then there is the climactic scene with Lukein a church. Dragline comes in and tries to get Luke to give up peaceably. Here, Dragline represents society's desire to get everyone to just mindlessly conform to its ways. Luke refuses, and ironically gets shot. This shooting is interesting if nothing else for the fact that the authorities not only have no reason to believe Luke is armed, but also for the fact that he gets shot for impersonating a prison official. Luke's soul has refused to conform to society's rules and ends up needing to get extinguished.

Thus, "Cool Hand Luke" becomes a comment on society. Luke dislikes the need of his fellow inmates to latch onto him so tightly. Luke dislikes rules, becoming a non-conformist. Society has constantly tried to extinguish the non-conformists. Examples include the Civil Rights Movement, the Feminist Movement, and the homosexuals. Like them, Luke is also a non-conformist. Like them, society clashes with Luke. Like them, society tries to kill Luke. Too bad society has not learned to deal with other people's views.

"Rear Window" is an excellent thriller by the master of suspense, Alfred Hitchcock. All throughout the film, the audience becomes a willing accomplice to a peeping tom. The audience watches the main character's neighbors right alongside the main character.

L.B. "Jeff" Jeffries (Jimmy Stewart) is confined to a wheelchair due to a bad accident in which Jeffries nearly lost his life. It was a car accident, occurring as Jeffries tries to get a picture of a car racing, but the race car ends up coming apart just as Jeffries takes his picture.

Needless to say, Jeffries gets injured and his camera gets broken. He has broken his leg, preventing him from being able to get out of his apartment. These days, when that happens, someone might take to spending their time watching television. However, this film takes place in the 50's, when television was just coming into it's own. As a matter of fact, at the time, advertising companies generally were not agreeing with their clients as to whether or not to advertise on television. The advertising companies thought television was doomed.

Hence we have the reason why Jeffries ends up spending his time watching the neighbors. He has nothing else to do. He makes up his own name for each of them. There is a woman he calls Miss Torso, who dances all the time. There is Miss Lonelyhearts , who cries herself to sleep every night. Then there is the traveling salesman, who Jeffries becomes very concerned about.

Turns out the salesman's wife is bed-ridden. Then why is no one paying attention to her? Why is it the salesman is wrapping such bizarre things as knives, and in newspaper?

The film is centered around this mystery, and the audience becomes a peeping tom themselves as they try to unravel the mystery alongside Jeffries.

What I am trying to point out here is that the film is entertaining, but, like all Hitchcock films, it requires a different sort of attention span than a modern day film does. Sure, the film is about the same length as modern films usually are, but modern films have to have something exciting happen often, something usually in which the main character's life is threatened. Take for example "I Robot." The character played by Will Smith cannot go more than twenty minutes before he has problems with the androids in that movie.

Unlike "I Robot" "Rear Window" has the ability to just focus on the mystery and the development of the characters it has. This is not to say that the film is not interesting. Trying to unravel the mystery to "Rear Window" is fun, even though it means becoming a neighborhood watchdog like Jeffries.

Also, considering the year the film was made, the portrayal of the woman in the film is somewhat sympathetic, like in other Hitchcock classics including "The Man Who Knew too Much." Films from around the time, such as"The Three Faces of Eve" have a tendency to look at all semi- strong woman as either loony or dangerous. "Rear Window," however, has a very sympathetic strong female character in the form of Lisa (Grace Kelly). She goes with the nurse to dig up the plot of ground Jeffries believes the wife is buried in. She is the one who goes and gives Mr. Thorwald (Raymond Burr, known to television audiences as Perry Mason) a threatening note and even breaks into Thorwald's apartment, an event that becomes pivotal to the story in a way I will not mention, through a second story window while wearing high- heels.

In other words, the women of the story make up for Mr. Jeffries' weakness.

These are all reasons why "Rear Window" has stood the test of time. Although there are also other reasons, the film is fun to watch if you don't have to have something exciting happen every few minutes in order for the film to keep your attention. The mystery to the film makes watching "Rear Window" a lot of fun.