 In 1950-something New York, an adventuresome free-lance photographer finds himself confined to a wheelchair in his tiny apartment while a broken leg mends. With only the occasional distraction of a visiting nurse and his frustrated love interest, a beautiful fashion consultant, his attention is naturally drawn to the courtyard outside his "rear window" and the occupants of the apartment buildings which surround it. Soon he is consumed by the private dramas of his neighbors lives which play themselves out before his eyes. There is "Miss Lonelyhearts," so desperate for her imaginary lover that she sits him a plate at the dinner table and feigns their ensuing chat. There is the frustrated composer banging on his piano, the sunbathing sculptress, the shapely dancer, the newlyweds who are concealed from their neighbors by a window shade, and a bungling middle-aged couple with a little yapping dog who sleep on the fire escape to avoid the sweltering heat of their apartment. ...And then there is the mysterious salesman whose nagging, invalid wife s sudden absence from the scene ominously coincides with middle-of-the-night forays into the dark, sleeping city with his sample case. Where did she go? What s in the trunk that the salesman ships away? What s he been doing with the knives and the saw that he cleans at the kitchen sink?