Rope (1948)

Director:

Alfred Hitchcock

Writers:

Hume Cronyn (adapted by)
Patrick Hamilton (from the play by)
(more)

Release Date:

28 August 1948 (USA)

Genre:

Crime | Drama | Thriller

Tagline:

The guest who's dead on time

Plot:

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.

Plot Keywords:

Party | Friend | Murder | Apartment | Chest

Awards:

3 nominations

Cast

Dick Hogan	...	David Kentley
John Dall	...	Brandon - His Friend
Farley Granger	...	Phillip - His Friend
Edith Evanson	...	Mrs. Wilson - Their Housekeeper
Douglas Dick	...	Kenneth - Their Rival
Joan Chandler	...	Janet - David's Girl
Cedric Hardwicke	...	Mr. Kentley - David's Father (as Sir Cedric Hardwicke)
Constance Collier	...	Mrs. Atwater - David's Mother
James Stewart	...	Rupert Cadell
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Alfred Hitchcock	...	Man Walking in Street After Opening Credits (uncredited)

Directed by
Alfred Hitchcock

Writing credits
Hume Cronyn		(adapted by)
Patrick Hamilton		(from the play by)
Arthur Laurents		(screenplay)
Ben Hecht		uncredited

Produced by
Sidney Bernstein	....	producer (uncredited)
Alfred Hitchcock	....	producer (uncredited)

Original Music by
David Buttolph		(uncredited)

Cinematography by
William V. Skall		(director of photography)
Joseph A. Valentine		(director of photography) (as Joseph Valentine)

Film Editing by
William H. Ziegler		(film editor)

Art Direction by
Perry Ferguson

Set Decoration by
Howard Bristol
Emile Kuri

Makeup Department
Perc Westmore	....	makeup artist
Agnes Flanagan	....	hair stylist (uncredited)
Ed Voight	....	makeup artist (uncredited)

Production Management
Fred Ahern	....	production manager

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Lowell J. Farrell	....	assistant director
Claude Archer	....	assistant director (uncredited)

Art Department
Dorothea Holt	....	illustrator (uncredited)
John More	....	props (uncredited)
Joe Trusty	....	props (uncredited)

Sound Department
Al Riggs	....	sound

Camera and Electrical Department
Richard Emmons	....	operator of camera movement
Eddie Fitzgerald	....	operator of camera movement (as Edward Fitzgerald)
Paul Hill	....	operator of camera movement (as Paul G. Hill)
James Potevin	....	lighting technician (as Jim Potevin)
Morris Rosen	....	operator of camera movement
Vic Jones	....	gaffer (uncredited)
Harry Marsh	....	assistant camera (uncredited)
John Miehle	....	still photographer (uncredited)
Harold Noyes	....	grip (uncredited)
Morris Rosen	....	grip (uncredited)
Phil Wagner	....	best boy (uncredited)

Costume and Wardrobe Department
Adrian	....	dress: Miss Chandler
Marion Dabney	....	wardrobe (uncredited)
Lillian House	....	wardrobe assistant (uncredited)
Leon Roberts	....	wardrobe (uncredited)

Music Department
Leo F. Forbstein	....	musical director

Other crew
Robert Brower	....	associate technicolor color director
Natalie Kalmus	....	technicolor color director
Dinsmore Alter	....	cloud technical advisor (uncredited)
Charlsie Bryant	....	script supervisor (uncredited)

Production Companies

• Warner Bros (presents)
• Transatlantic Pictures (as TRANSATLANTIC PICTURES' production) (as A Transatlantic Pictures Production also)

Distributors

• Warner Bros (1948) (USA) (theatrical)
• Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) (1948) (UK) (theatrical)
• Universal Pictures (198?) (USA) (theatrical) (re-release)
• MCA Home Video (1985) (USA) (VHS)
• Universal Pictures (2001) (Germany) (DVD)
• Universal Pictures (2001) (Germany) (VHS)
• Action Cinémas (2008) (France) (theatrical) (re-release)
• Fox Films (1963) (Finland) (theatrical) (re-release)
• United International Pictures (UIP) (1989) (Finland) (theatrical) (re-release)
• United International Pictures (UIP) (1995) (France) (theatrical) (re-release)
• Warner Bros. (1950) (France) (theatrical)
• Warner Bros. (1956) (Italy) (theatrical)
• Audivisivi San Paolo (????) (Italy) (video)
• Avo Film Edizioni (????) (Italy) (video)
• CDE Home Video (????) (Italy) (video)
• CIC Video (????) (Italy) (video)
• De Agostini (????) (Italy) (video)
• Esselte Video (????) (Finland) (VHS)
• Gruppo Editoriale Bramante (????) (Italy) (video)
• M&R (????) (Italy) (video)
• MCA/Universal Home Video (USA) (VHS)
• MCA/Universal Home Video (USA) (laserdisc)
• Skema (????) (Italy) (video)
• Sony Pictures Home Entertainment (2008) (Greece) (DVD)
• United Artists (1950-1983) (worldwide) (all media)
• Universal Home Entertainment (2000) (USA) (DVD)
• Universal Pictures Home Entertainment (2001) (Germany) (DVD)
• Universal Pictures Home Entertainment (201?) (Italy) (DVD) (also Blu-ray)

Other Companies

• CDC  Italian dubbing by (uncredited)
• The Three Suns  radio sequence by

Also Known As:

"Alfred Hitchcock's Rope" - UK (complete title), USA (complete title)

Runtime:

80 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Sound System)

Certification:

Argentina:13 | Australia:PG | Canada:14A (video rating) | Canada:AA (original rating) | Finland:K-16 | Germany:16 | Norway:16 | Sweden:11 (re-release) | Sweden:15 (original rating) | UK:PG (video rating) (1988) | USA:Approved (PCA #13027) | USA:PG | Portugal:M/12 | Spain:T | Iceland:L | Brazil:14 | South Korea:18 (2003) | New Zealand:PG | Portugal:(Banned) (original rating) | USA:TV-G (TV rating) | UK:A (original rating) (passed with cuts) | UK:PG (tv rating) | Italy:VM14 | France:U | Finland:K-15 (new rating: 2001)

Filming Locations:

Warner Brothers Burbank Studios - 4000 Warner Boulevard, Burbank, California, USA

Company:

Warner Bros

Trivia:

The film was banned in a number of American cities because of the implied homosexuality of Phillip (Farley Granger) and Brandon (John Dall).

Goofs:

Incorrectly regarded as goofs: Some viewers have noted that the police are summoned after three shots are fired out the window whereas nobody seems to notice when one shot is fired in the apartment during the scuffle for the gun. A single shot muffled by the apartment walls would not attract nearly as much attention as three shots fired out an open window.

Quotes:

Rupert Cadell:After all, murder is - or should be - an art. Not one of the 'seven lively', perhaps, but an art nevertheless. And, as such, the privilege of committing it should be reserved for those few who are really superior individuals.
Brandon Shaw:And the victims: inferior beings whose lives are unimportant anyway.
Rupert Cadell:Obviously. Now, mind you, I don't hold with the extremists who feel that there should be open season for murder all year round. No, personally, I would prefer to have..."Cut a Throat Week"... or, uh, "Strangulation Day"...

Movie Connections:

Featured in The Celluloid Closet (1995)

Soundtrack:

I'm Looking Over a Four-Leaf Clover

The birth of an "eye"

I place this one in my list of films anyone should watch. That is, in order to understand some fundamental issues on film-making and films in the last 50 years.

What i'm least interested in here are the technical innovations. Those represent today a curiosity, a museum fact, worth being remembered and credited to those who worked for them, but just it.

I'm also not so interested in the underlying taboo subjects, namely those regarding the homosexuality issue. In respect to that, i even think the whole film construction, from casting to scene writing threw away many things. I'll get morecontroversial. I think Hitchcock in fact despised those messages (the writers were worried in exploring them, not Hitch), he was not after meanings or controversies, he was after something far more ingenious and influential. I'm talking about his camera eye.

Before this one, all Hitch's work was something between a classical construction and some exploration of the camera as carrier of a character's (and the audience's) emotion/feeling/sensation. The library scene in 'Shadow of a doubt', for example, is the perfect example of what i'm talking about. Anyway, that will Hitch had of making the camera follow around characters, sets, and reveal what a character (or "god") had to reveal was already notable. In here, he made that the theme of the picture. One single set, very few characters, a clear as water story (which he made even clearer by not throwing any doubt about the destiny of the murdered boy). The sexual issues also go to second importance issues. The apartment is at once simple enough to solve the technical difficulties of filming it, and large and divided enough to allow the camera to explore it, searching for elements, for dialogues or for actions. The camera has curiosity, it is almost a character, a character called audience. Years later, in different molds, Hitch would place Stewart behind the camera and definitely assume it as a physical character in the plot (Rear Window). In here what we get is fully a camera that moves to the whishes of the director. The curious, ever searching camera that dePalma would reinvent and Polanski master shows up here.

I believe the work of dePalma, in a way Polanski, Chabrol and even some Godard (Le mépris is filled with this) all derive from what happened here. Hitchcock would probably hit the top with Rear Window, but here is where he becomes an inventor.

My evaluation: 5/5 . one of the cinematic manifestos