I really wanted to like this film...

Rating: 5/10 (8 April 2013)

I watched the film all the way through and largely enjoyed it, but there was no suspense or tension for me, instead being somewhat predictable. I read the synopsis about a murder taking place in a neighbour's apartment and that is exactly what happened.
Perhaps the main reason this film failed up to live up to my extremely high expectations was watching it the day after Sidney Lumet's incredible '12 Angry Men' starring Henry Fonda. It's not in the same league.
The main disappointments for me were the plot holes and general non-believability, such as the argument with the detective friend, leading to a stormy exit and a quip along the lines of 'don't bother me again, if you're looking for future help use the yellow pages', followed by a phone call to the aforementioned detective's house, answered by the maid, the message being passed on, accepted as being credible even though he didn't believe the story after several face to face conversations, but instead believing a message passed on by the maid, proceeded by a hurried return to the apartment of the wheelchair-ridden voyeur to go through the whole thing all over again, effectively rubbishing any previous convictions held by the detective or those investigated by the police department.
Another gaping issue is the improbability of a man spending day after day spying on others, sometimes with reflective binoculars and zoom lenses, but not being observed by anyone else. No-one looks at the camera once, except for the murderer at the end of the movie. Society is such that people are more concerned with getting on with their own lives than worrying about others. Not even a paranoid murderer sitting in the dark, lights off, smoking cigarettes, is concerned about a man sitting at his window day and night looking in his direction.
Further improbability is Grace Kelly in the murderer's apartment when she suddenly gets caught, resulting in a physical struggle, followed by our observing 'hero' calling the police, then followed by a pair of cops arriving almost immediately at the upstairs apartment and preventing the murderer from wrestling the intruder onto the couch.
People go out leaving their doors on the latch, a question of personal preference, but having ladders conveniently spanning the exterior of buildings, leading up to the apartment in focus with windows wide open, enabling a half-competent cat burglar in an enormous $1000 dollar frock to slip inside unobserved. Just a little too far fetched for me.
I enjoyed the film, the acting was nice, the coming together of two different worlds into a love story was interesting, the beauty of Grace Kelly absolutely divine, but the plot holes were really distracting and the level of suspense mostly absent.
I've now got 'Vertigo' and 'North by Northwest' to watch on my list of Hitchcock films, so I've mentally dampened my expectations to avoid disappointment. Just remember never to watch this film after the fantastic '12 Angry Men' from 1957.