Set Makes Absolutely No Sense!

I noticed that too. Might have been explained, saying the doc's apt door was just beside Baxter's kitchen, but the windows take any and all plausible answers right out the.... yeah.


We've met before, haven't we?

Thank you GBennett; I had thought of starting a thread on this topic. I love to study floor plans and have lived in various NYC apartments over the last 40 years, so after watching the film again last night I mentally sketched out the floor plan, noticing for example that the kitchen and bathroom are back to back which is normal for efficient plumbing. And how nice that the apartment has full cross ventilation with windows facing the street and windows facing the back--not too many apartments have that. Then WHOA, no way could that bedroom have windows facing the back because that is the wall he shares with the Dreyfuss couple. His apartment would have had to be a large studio with no windows in the sleeping area, or else have an indentation on the side wall with a matching indentation on the building next door so each could have side windows looking out to an airshaft.

But as with "Double Indemnity" the director took a little license for a plot point (needed the windows for the mention of temptation to jump out). I think I first saw the film before moving to NYC, and didn't even think of this issue.

I posted about this many moons ago, but it looks like IMDB from time to time cleans up older posts, and it seems to be gone.
Anyway, the windows vs. blind wall is not the (only) problem; the distance from the door to Baxter's apartment to the doctor's is simply shorter than the depth of Baxter's kitchen plus the bathroom width plus the 2 meters between door and kitchen. In any normal geometry entering Dreyfus's apartment would get you in Baxter's bathroom, or even his kitchen.


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Rome. By all means, Rome.

Yeah, I noticed this too.

And what about the set for the floor where CC worked? Notice how the columns just stop on the left side in some of the long shots? Makes for a better view in terms of filming, but it's architecturally unsound.




I want the doctor to take your picture so I can look at you from inside as well.

I really don't notice stuff like that to be honest.

Yes, the layouts of the two key adjoining apartments make no sense at all, "architecturally-wise". :-) They must have simply felt the need to scrunch the two ultra-close together, like a stage-play set, to allow for close proximity of Baxter's & the doctor's doors, to facilitate quick transit from one door to the other and allow it to be easily captured in a single camera shot - or frame, or whatever it's called. Except for that purpose, it all makes no real-life sense whatsoever.

What a collection of morons. None of you have lived in pre-war, or tenement apartments, have you? If you had the windows, the arrangement of the apartments, EVERYTHING, would make perfect sense. You think Wilder's an idiot, idiots?

SHAFTWAYS!!!

I just watched "The Apartment" again after not seeing it in many years and the issue about the layout of the apartments stood out right from the first scene involving Baxter's apartment building.

In my mind, it is possible that Dryefuss' apartment begins exactly at the end of Baxter's kitchen (one would enter Dreyfuss' apartment with Baxter's kitchen directly on your left). That would mean that Baxter's bathroom and bedroom kind of wraparound Dreyfuss's apartment. Since we never see Dreyfuss' apartment, we don't know the layout so one could argue that it worked. The Dreyfuss' apartment would have certainly had an odd layout.

Funny how some people notice things like this and others don't. But like other people note, it doesn't diminish the overall film. "The Apartment" is still a great movie.