Product Description

Architect Terry Lambert (Steve Guttenberg) takes pity on Sylvia Wentworth (Isabelle Huppert), the apparently put-upon wife of his brutish boss (Paul Shenar). Terry commences an affair with Sylvia and during a break between seductions, Sylvia hears a woman screaming from outside her bedroom window. She looks down to see a mysterious man strangling helpless victim Denise (Elizabeth McGovern). By the time Terry comes to the window, he can see only a crowd of spectators. The next day, Terry learns that another girl has been attacked and murdered, and begins to deduce that the killer may be the same person who assaulted Denise. He wants to go to the police, but Sylvia refuses to get involved. Or is she already involved?

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #36759 in DVD
• Brand: Lions Gate
• Released on: 2006-11-14
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: Spanish
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 112 minutes

Amazon.com
L.A. Confidential director Curtis Hanson had been knocking around Hollywood for several years helming B-grade fare when he wrote and directed this crisp Hitchcock homage. Steve Guttenberg plays a guy who is fooling around with his boss's wife (Isabelle Huppert). When she witnesses an attempted rape from his apartment, he agrees to be the one to report it. But he didn't see it and his story begins to fall apart; soon the cops begin to look at him as a suspect. His life becomes increasingly complex: Before he knows it, he is on the run for murder, framed for a crime he didn't commit with seemingly no way to prove his innocence. Guttenberg, who has built a career on roles in sub-B films, rose to the occasion (though his subsequent taste in material didn't improve) and Hanson gave the film enough suspenseful twists to keep the audience guessing. --Marshall Fine

Customer Reviews

Master trumped by apprentice.
This will probably be the only movie starring Steve Guttenberg that I'll give 5 stars to, so listen up. OK, that was a little harsh. Actually, Steve's tolerable here. He plays a yuppie who commences an affair with his boss's wife (Isabelle Huppert). While a yuppie probably isn't out of his range, French beauty Isabelle Huppert IS . . . but then, in Hitch's *Rear Window*, Grace Kelly was way out of Jimmy Stewart's league. Guttenberg, over and beyond his short-lived bankability in the mid-80's, was clearly a deliberate casting choice by director Curtis Hanson: he's a perfect Everyday Shmo that we can "identify" with, like Stewart's rubes used to be (before the country stopped being so corny). *The Bedroom Window* imitates Hitchcock in more ways than merely casting and the title. It "homages" the Master in the best way: by fashioning an exceedingly clever plot that compares favorably, in many cases MORE favorably, quite frankly, with Hitchock's narrative contrivances. The plot strands get SO involved that it's hardly worth trying to recount them; it's easier to just recommend the movie. *The Bedroom Window* is nothing less than a formally perfect imitation of elements in Hitchcock's best films. Even Guttenberg's perky acting ("I wanna turn myself in!" he chirps on the phone to the cops after he's on the run) is reminiscent of Cary Grant's smirking aplomb in the face of Kafka-esque bad luck in *North By Northwest*. And Elizabeth McGovern's disguise late in the movie recalls Kim Novak transforming physically for the sake of some guy's lust in *Vertigo*. Having said all this, you might be asking, "Why not just watch Hitchcock?" It's the perfect question for Gus Van Zant's pointless, unimaginative, frame-for-frame re-make of *Psycho*. But Hanson brings rancid new things to this genre that Hitchcock tended to avoid, things like individual culpability, black serendipity, and the notion that Doing the Right Thing can backfire on you if you're a compromised person . . . and who isn't? These themes, straight out of novelist Patricia Highsmith's work, provide chocolate for Hitchock's peanut butter. What can I say -- I like Reese's.

PAN & SCAN HITS DVD with PIONNEER
This is not a review on "The Bedroom Window" which is by the way a fairly exciting suspenser well directed by Curtis "L.A Confidential" Hanson, but an outburst of anger against the scandalous, revolting, outrageous and insulting behaviour of the PIONNEER "mob" who are injecting Pan & Scan in what was till now an intelligent, exciting and most tempting new standard: DVD. It is really upsetting to see that some scumbags (excuse the word but I am really really furious) are not giving us the choice between widescreen and full screen formats. It is depressing to think that DVD could become in the near future what VHS used to be. Something that destroyed pictures instead of giving them a new life. I beg you not to encourage this kind of products by avoiding them completely. The Bedroom Window was shot in 2.35:1 (scope) which simply means that half of the picture is missing. PIONNEER is a sure stinker and as far as I am concerned I am banning all their products. The Cassandra Crossing has just benefited of the same shock treatment. That was not what DVD was created for.

Guttenberg Great
This is indeed Steve Guttenberg's best drama. Being a huge fan of Hitchcock's works and other suspense movies like "Along Came a Spider" and "Body Double", I found this movie pretty good. I personally think Steve is a decent actor, just limited in roles suited to him. This role was suited to him as was "Cocoon". Purest may not be impressed by this movie, but those not so demanding should find this worth their while.

The story in a nutshell is Guttenberg is sleeping with the bosses wife so when she sees an attempted murder she can't report it so Steve does instead. Since it is a man reporting they are more suspicious of him thinking either he's a voyuer or worse yet perhaps the perpetrator. Things get tense as he tries to prove his innocence and the real culprit is aware of the bosses wife and him. Is this a ripoff of the Hitchcock movie. A little, but the update and slight story change make it interesting and different enough that I found it entertaining.

By the way don't buy this DVD from a scalper for a ridiculous price. It is being redistributed in November 2006. I pre-ordered mine for $9.99.