Rope

Rope  

Rope is a thriller made in 1948 by Alfred Hitchcock, and the actors include James Stewart, John Dall and Farley Granger. 

Two young men strangle their "inferior" classmate, hide his body in their apartment, and invite his friends and family to a dinner party as a means to challenge the "perfection" of their crime. 

Amazingly, this film was based on a true story. It was converted into a film from Patrick Hamilton's play (1929) 'rope', which was based off the death of a 14 year year old named Bobby Franks. He was killed by Leopold and Loeb, who desired to commit the perfect crime.

The scene opens from the outside, establishing where we are, what time of day it is etc. Then the camera eventually finds it self in a room, where Brandon and Phillip are strangling David. Obviously they kill him, and hide him in the book trunk. They decided that they were going to hold a party, proving their intelligence to try and mastermind the perfect crime. They hold it in the living room, placing the spread on the trunk Davids body is lying in!

By now everybody is concerned about the whereabouts of David. Brandon tries to reunite Janet and Kenneth, who were former lovers. The conversation turns to disaster (it turns out that Philip is very proficient at strangling chickens), and Rupert explains that some people are superior to others and have the privilege to kill inferiors if they so wish. He says it in a light-hearted way but with conviction.

Then things start going wrong: Janet and Kenneth argue with Brandon and virtually accuse him of kidnapping David; Rupert notices Philip's agitation and begins interrogating him. At the end of the party, Rupert puts on the wrong hat -- it is David's hat. Brandon and Philip think they have got away with murder and prepare to dispose of David's body, but Rupert returns to find out the truth. A fight ensues over a gun, Rupert wins, fires three shots out of the window and waits for the police to come. 

In the movie, James Stewart's Rupert seems more like an intellectual without emotional experience who realists his position is wrong when he responds emotionally to David's death. To a certain extent, Rupert is to blame because he put these ideas into Brandon's head and encouraged him, although the act itself was carried out by Philip egged on by the dominant Brandon.

The whole film is done in ten-minute takes (the maximum amount of film held in a film camera) and transitions from one take to the other are covered by the people walking into shot filling the screen. This gives us the impression that we are seeing what is happening in real time. This is the legend. However, there is said to be one definite cut, when Brandon talks about Philip strangling chickens, Philip shouts and then we cut directly to Rupert's face. In "Rope," Hitchcock is not concerned with the characters and their moral dilemmas. Here the concern is on the way the characters look, sound and move, and with the overall spectacle of how a perfect crime goes wrong.

The suspense in Rope is created through the chest. Its normally always in shot, and makes the audience have a slight rush of fear and adrenaline.  we wonder what will happen next? will the two men (and body) be found and brought to justice? do we want them to be caught? The audience is constantly looking for answers, and this is due to suspense.

Dramatic Irony is something that the audience knows that the characters don't.We obviously know Davids in the chest, and because of this there is no red herrings as the plot is based around                                                                                           Davids death and the chest. We know                                                                                       everything.                                                                                                      



look at how these follow narrative thories






























#