One of Alfred Hitchcock's weirder films, Rope is based upon Patrick Hamilton's play. Hitchcock took the opportunity to use a new directing technique for the filming of Rope. Each shot was to be 10 minutes long, and never a cut in between those 10 minutes. This process had to be carefully planned, for the camera was to be moved around while the actors were, well, acting. One mistake whould mean 10 minutes of mistakes. This aggravated the film's leading star, James Stewart, quite a bit. No matter, the finished product looks excellent. Rope was also Hitchcock's first film as producer.
Now on to the plot synopsis....Do you believe in the perfect murder? Well Brandon (John Dall) and Philip (Farley Granger) do. Brandon, but not so much Philip, seems to agree with their old prep school headmaster, Rupert (James Stewart), that murder is an art, and should be allowed to people who are considered 'superior' human beings. A 'superior' human being is one who can pull off the murder without getting caught. So Brandon and Philip decide on an experiment. The experiment is to kill, by strangulation, one of their prep school chums, and hide the body in a chest within their appartment. When the experiment is carried out, they hold a party, with all of their victim's family and friends attending. This is what Brandon thinks is the art of the murder. Rupert has attended the party and has suspicions about his two former students. Does Rupert discover that his sick idealogies were taken too far by Brandon and Philip, or are they able to commit the perfect murder?
Because the movie only used one set (a set of a New York appartment), it made Hitchcock's cameo the hardest one yet. Learn all about it at the WWW links page. Another interesting fact about this movie, is that it is shown completly in real time. So, the movie is much like the play, which makes the movie very intriguing to watch.
For some interesting facts about ROPE,
click here.
If you saw this film and think of it in any negative ways, I want you to e mail me about it. I want to hear every bit of critism out there so that I can make this page better.
Unfortunatly there are not many web pages out there for Rope, but there are several Hitchcock pages that have mini features on the film, so check out our Hitchcock links
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