Raymond Burr is most famous as the invincible Perry Mason, but in Rear Window we saw him as the villain. In this movie, he has a much bigger villain part, as Rick, and makes much more impression as such. His towering presence is well used, and we hear him presenting his evil plan in a very elegant manner, packaging his plan in the most perfect "nice" expressions.
Burr makes my favorite quote from the movie, landed with perfect timing:
"He was screaming he wanted out. When a man screams, I don't like it. Especially a friend. He might scream loud enough for the D.A. to hear. I don't want to hurt the D.A's ears.... He's sensitive."
On top of this, we have the overall gray and "noir" mood of the picture, about a man with very bad odds (Joe Sullivan/O'Keefe), and two women, one of them his loyal accomplice Pat (Claire Trevor), who is also narrator of the story, and Ann (Marsha Hunt) who is forced to join them. Joe's feelings for the two is the constant worry of Pat, hopelessly in love with Joe. All three do their parts well.
A weakness of the movie, showing its age, is that the action scenes are pretty primitive. We have to live with that for movies this old.
Burr makes my favorite quote from the movie, landed with perfect timing:
"He was screaming he wanted out. When a man screams, I don't like it. Especially a friend. He might scream loud enough for the D.A. to hear. I don't want to hurt the D.A's ears.... He's sensitive."
On top of this, we have the overall gray and "noir" mood of the picture, about a man with very bad odds (Joe Sullivan/O'Keefe), and two women, one of them his loyal accomplice Pat (Claire Trevor), who is also narrator of the story, and Ann (Marsha Hunt) who is forced to join them. Joe's feelings for the two is the constant worry of Pat, hopelessly in love with Joe. All three do their parts well.
A weakness of the movie, showing its age, is that the action scenes are pretty primitive. We have to live with that for movies this old.