The window

A separation from Jeff and the outside world, Hitchcock uses the rear window as a cinema screen. Curtains are raised and the action starts, then Lisa later draws the blinds and declares the ‘show’s over’. Each of the neighbours that Jeff observes are also framed by their windows, creating dozens of tiny little frames like television sets. In this way, Jeff’s use of the rear window to fulfill his voyeuristic desires and the viewer’s cinematic experience are aligned. The windows represent privacy and drawn blinds, such as the Newlyweds’, ensure this. Conversely, an unobstructed window offers no privacy. The ethical dilemma for Jeff and others becomes whether it is acceptable to look through the window uninvited.

The burial motif

Hitchcock’s Rear Window contains an ongoing burial motif which is first noticed in the quirky signature on Jeff’s leg cast, ‘Here lie the broken bones of L. B. Jefferies’, a short note that reads like an epitaph on a headstone. Following this are the flowers under which Thorwald has buried something like a grave. When the dog is suspicious and digs at the garden, the dog is killed. On discovering the dog’s body, Miss Lonelyhearts lays him in a basket like a coffin and raises him toward the sky like an ascension scene. Collectively, accepting that Mrs Thorwald has been encased in a trunk or parts of her placed in a hat box, Hitchcock keeps the funeral motif as a reminder throughout the film that death is nearby.

Jeff’s leg cast

Seen as a cocoon from which he will emerge, Jeff’s cast is a symbol of his current impotence and inability to work. Not only is Jeff unable to fulfil his intrepid lifestyle, he is also sedentary in the sense that he is unable to feel any attraction towards Lisa, even as she tries her best to seduce him. Although Jeff will transform as expected while in the plaster cocoon, the addition of more plaster may indicate he has further to go.

Lisa’s clothes

Lisa’s clothing emblematises her transformation as well as her ground breaking boldness. Her glamorous dresses reveal her elegance and refinery whilst also communicating a degree of incompatibility with Jeff. However, as she changes and compromises throughout the film, her wardrobe also becomes much more practical and much less ostentatious as the film wears on, until she is finally wearing a smart blouse, jeans and a pair of loafers. Interjected into this transformation is the appearance of Lisa’s nightgown. While the silky negligee highlights her femininity, it also suggests she will be sleeping with Jeff that night. Detective Doyle notices the sleepwear and starts to make a point of it but is reigned in by Jeff. The fact Lisa has the nightwear hidden in a small case shows the secretive nature of their affair.

The camera

The smashed camera representing Jeff’s condition can be seen among the mis-en-scene in his apartment. As a photographer, Jeff uses a camera to make a living. The camera is a symbol of the emotional distance he puts between himself and those on the other end of the lens, a distance he continues to enjoy as he employs his lenses to spy on the neighbours. Jeff’s long-focus camera lens is a symbol of his passive male gaze, which is more or less the only thing he can do in his condition. It is the main means through which he observes other people, and it also thus symbolises his voyeuristic tendencies. Some may extend this to metaphorically see the lens as a phallic symbol. Ultimately, his camera equipment, which conceptualises his livelihood, will save him as he uses the flash to buy enough time for the police to arrive.