Without question Roman Polanski’s most interesting movie, carrying with it major echoes of Hitchcock’s Psycho but also sparking off many imitator with its incredibly fluid camera work and surreal overtones.

Based don the novel by Roland Tapor, Polanski not only directs but also stars as the mild mannered Trelkovsky who moves into a run down apartment in a block where the previous occupant tried to kill themselves by jumping out of the window, in another Hitchcockian homage (to Rear Window) Trelkovsky begins to become obsessed with the goings on in the apartments opposite and with the life of the previous tenant, the film becoming darker as he begins to descend into madness.

With a real killer ending and some powerful scenes (witness the tooth in a hole in the wall and Polanski’s sociopathic behavior in a park). A mostly French cast (that includes the very beautiful Isabelle Adjani) is enlivened by the playing of two ageing Hollywood stars Shelley Winters (as the concierge) and Melvyn Douglas. Only extra is the original trailer.