Film Review: Rope

Alfred Hitchcock's Rope (1948) is a film within the crime/thriller genre, involving two murderers, who hide a body inside of a chest while they host a dinner party. To escalate the level of tension even higher, the guests invited include the fiancé, father and old schoolteacher of the murder victim. Oh, and they're eating the laid out food off of the same chest that his body lies in, if things weren't making you feel apprehensive enough! David (Dick Hogan) is murdered seconds into the film, by Brandon (John Dall) and Phillip (Farley Granger) by a piece of rope. From the point onwards from David's body being placed inside of the chest and it being closed, the camera does not stray far at all from the chest for the rest of the movie. The corpse lingers near the camera for the whole duration, constantly in front of not only the audience who are fully aware of the body, but in front of his family members and friends who spend the whole film standing right by the chest and even eat off of it. While the party guests drink and celebrate throughout the evening oblivious to the dark crime, the viewers are brought to the edge of their seats from early on, enduring a completely different experience to the party than the unaware guests. "The murderers need an audience to applaud their crimes, and with their dinner guests in the dark, our privileged knowledge of what's in the trunk makes us uneasily complicit in what they've done." (Hutchinson, 2012) To an extent, the audience are meant to suffer more than the characters in Rope. Maybe this is to compensate for the lack of emotional guilt that Brandon displays, who appears to feel relieved and even proud that he has committed murder.

Figure. 1. Rope film poster.

A way in which Hitchcock engaged with the audience even further, was by pulling them into the film's atmosphere. His aim was to convince the viewers that the passing of time in Rope was continuous, without any skipping or jumping ahead through the element of time. To create this convincing effect, Hitchcock avoided using camera cuts, and instead focused on one camera that roamed around the rooms. If the camera is looking at one group of characters and is going to alter the view/position to spectate another group, instead of a hard cut occurring the camera will simply approach where it needs to be, and so on. Doing this makes the element of time seem present and real, which creates a more believable scenario for an audience to withstand. In reality of course, the idea that this film is done in one shot is just an illusion. "Due to the constraints of both the equipment used in the shooting of films and in projecting them in cinemas, it was only possible to shoot 10 minutes of continuous footage onto one reel. This meant that Hitchcock could not exceed this time when filming Rope, leading him to find imaginative solutions to the problem of using cuts." (Marthasmarvels, 2017) Despite the fact there are literally only a couple of cuts that are obvious, and visibility of them is not intended to be hidden, there are a lot of cuts that Hitchcock tried to camouflage in order to create the continuous time effect. For example, the camera will zoom in towards someone's blazer, then zoom back out again over a matter of seconds, when a cut needed to be made. The same would be done at times when the camera focuses on an object, which are probably the harder cuts to notice. Hitchcock took an avant-garde approach to the film when it came to the camera's output. Even though some camera cuts can be noticed it doesn't make his experimental methods any less successful to a modern audience, despite the fact it wasn't so popular years ago at the time of release. 

To excel the dramatic tension felt by the audience even further, "the hidden edits and use of handheld cameras follow and track its characters, allowing audiences to experience and react to each situation at the same moment the actors do -- right in the thick of the action." (Renée, 2013) As the guests mingle and depart from each other occasionally to engage in a new conversation, the camera will find a new interesting spot to sit, allowing the viewers to be up-close spectators to the words shared between characters. There are moments when characters are put to one side with each other to speak in private, this of course is given to the audience, to show the other problems and troubling emotions that are occurring, besides a dead body being in the room. 

Figure. 2. Rope film still.

As time passes and the New York City backdrop darkens as the evening draws in, eager guests are becoming growingly anxious about David's unexplained whereabouts. Worry rises gradually, at a similar pace to the tension the audience feel. Whether you watch and want the body to be discovered, or you want it to stay hidden, you are going to feel nervous either way. The fact that the party is predominantly populated in the same room as the chest, and a table cloth is placed over it following the food which the guests eat from, maintains the sensation of adrenaline and intensifies the audience's nervousness even further. One part of the film that meddles with the viewer's nerves in an attempt to drag them to the edge of their seats, is where the camera is sat still with the trunk in its sight. (See Fig.1) The crowd's of people's backs can be seen only just on screen while they're conversing, but it is difficult to pay attention to them during this shot. This is because Mrs. Wilson (Edith Evanson) is walking in and out of the room through the hall, undressing the table cloth from the chest as well as all other objects. There is a moment where she opens it to place some books inside, but is only just stopped by Brandon less than seconds before the body could be seen. This is such an intense moment, and the fact that the camera is watching over the chest before this, creates a build up of inevitable tension to attack the nerves of the audience even higher. Having to be the observer of the crime almost being discovered is going to cause frustration, as all the audience can do is look in without the ability to help hide or expose the murder. The people watching this film are the only ones who receive the blessing, of possessing this important knowledge regarding the crime, but Hitchcock makes you question if instead it is more so a curse. The high stakes of this risk are presented right at the beginning, stretched over the whole duration of the movie. So when watching Rope, you get the privilege of witnessing the murder. However, not long into the film and you might just wish you hadn't, due to the tension that will grind up your nerves, mixing anxiety with excitement uncontently while you experience the feeling of the two men's guilt. 

Illustration List

Figure. 1. S Caroline, Rope film poster. https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/garbolaughs.wordpress.com/2011/06/14/rope-1948/amp/ (Accessed 17/01/18) 

Figure. 2. The Seventh Art, Rope film still. https://theseventhart.info/tag/rope/ (Accessed 17/01/18)

Bibliography

Hutchinson P. (2012) https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/film/filmblog/2012/jul/27/my-favourite-hitchcock-rope (Accessed 16/01/18)

Marthasmarvels. (2017) https://www.lomography.com/magazine/118551-appreciating-films-rope-alfred-hitchcocks-experimental-stunt (Accessed 16/01/18)

Renée V. (2013) https://nofilmschool.com/2013/10/understanding-hidden-editing-in-hitchcocks-rope (Accessed 16/01/18)