by Moe Zilla

Created on: February 13, 2008   Last Updated: February 14, 2008

"Rope" is one of Alfred Hitchcock's strangest movies. It tells the story of two killers, and its very first shot pans across the city to discover the killers strangling their victim.

But the film's real tension will come from their cover-up. Two arrogant college students believe they can commit the crime without penalty, even leaving the body hidden in a chest in the center of their living room shortly before guests arrive for a dinner party. And those guests will include the victim's father and aunt , as well as his fiance. The hour after the murder unfolds in real-time, with the film never leaving its secretly guilty perpetrators and their increasingly uncomfortable dinner party. James Stewart plays the key guest, a former college advisor who suspects something is wrong.

It's a fascinating example of the master film director at work. Hitchcock wanted to film this movie as one continuous take, chronicling the suspenseful game of cat-and-mouse between Stewart's character and the two young killers. Cameras in 1948 could only film ten minutes on a single reel, but Hitchcock found some innovative ways to create the same effect. In one scene, a character walks directly towards the camera, momentarily filling the screen with darkness (and allowing a seamless cut to the next reel of film). And one of the most effective shots involves a party guest helpfully tidying up the living room. As dialogue continues in the background, she removes the candles from the top of the chest, and then removes the table cloth on top of it. And then she begins to open the chest....

There's other interesting touches. As young Phillip plays the piano, James Stewart's character grills him about increasingly uncomfortable topics. While discussing whether Phillip had ever strangled a chicken, Phillip plays a song that moves from harmony to modern discord, and Stewart's character casually turns on a rhythm-counting metronome to add still more discord to the scene. And suddenly the rope used for the strangling appears in the scene. Phillip's partner in crime, Brandon, has used it to tie a gift package for one of their guests.

Ultimately the film's strengths are also its weaknesses. Since all the action is confined to a single room, all of its intrigue will rest on its young stars. While it's an interesting experiment, it's ultimately less exciting and compelling than some of Hitchcock's more sinister films.

But there's an interesting historical footnote. The film was based on a 1928 play, which some say was based on the infamous "Leopold and Loeb" case, a real-life murder committed by two college students in 1924. Eventually both those men went to prison. "Rope" ultimately asks a simple but morbid question: whether two similar young men in Hitchcock's universe can escape the same fate.

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