I picked the movie because it starred Jimmy Stewart and he's my favorite actor from that time period. Luckily enough for me it turned out to be a pretty amazing movie.
There are only 10 takes in the entire movie so each shot lasts at least ten minutes. It makes sense because it’s based on Hamilton's play Rope's End BUT it’s still very impressive. It means almost no editing, impressive acting where rehearsal time must have been outrageous. No one could mess up and most of the cuts were hidden with blacking out with character's backs and coming out again in a new take.
So the acting was obviously very impressive since they had to go for such a long time. The camera follows the characters in such an interesting way and pans the room at the most intense times. Long shots are so rare in American cinema it was quite surprising to see them in this film, following the maid as she cleans off the area where the dead body is hidden. Conversation is going on off-screen which is also pretty unheard of in Hollywood films.
Even though the costumes were just suits and party dresses they were obviously meticulously planned. Each article was just enough different to set the characters apart from one another but without being loud or gaudy. And the importance of the hat left in the closet was a great clue to the puzzle of solving the whereabouts of the missing person. The background was also rather impressive. It was obviously fake of course but it showed the passage of time and activities of a city, with billowing smokestacks and blinking lights.
The narrative takes a more personal turn as the camera follows the direction of Jimmy Stewart's character as he explains what he would do if HE had to murder someone. The camera presumably follows the interactions between the victim and the murderers before the movie began, including a first person perspective of the angle of strangulation.
The stacked books falling off the chest as Rupert finally has proof of the truth was a nice touch to make the moment more powerful. And the idea that he'd shoot the gun out the window to get immediate attention and police assistance seemed rather brilliant. One of the few ways the murderers couldn't try to stop him. And then the film ends with police sirens approaching and the change in sound implies their arrival instead of a visual reference.

Well done, Hitchcock.