Comparing elements: Rear Window (1954) VS Disturbia ( 2007 remake)

There are several similutes in the remake by D.J. Caruso that are tributes to the originial movie by Alfred Hitchcock.

• First of all, in the original movie, Rear Window, the character L.B. Jeffries portrayed by James Stewart has to wear a leg in cast after an accident as a professional photographer. This makes him stay home in a wheelchair unable to leave, because the magazine he works for wants him to fully recuperate.
•          In the remake Disturbia, the teenager Kale Brecht played by Shia LaBeouf is convicted to house     arrest because of hitting his spanish class high school teacher, who made a commet about his dead father in class. He has to wear an ankle monitor that will alert the police if he leaves a electronic wire that surrounds the house for a distance of 30,5 meters.
• Both characters, Brecht and Jeffries, become voyeurs of their neirbours because of their boredom, using binoculars to spy on them (while Brech uses also webcameras as a sign that the times have changed).
• We can also see paralles in the roles of the friend aiding the main character in both films: in Rear Window, Wendell Corey interprets the police detective Tom Doyle, while in Disturbia, Aaron Yoo portays the playfull charecter of Ronnie (although this character has a more active role that Tom Doyle in Rear Window).
• The character of the girlfrined helping investigating the crime is also present in both films. While in the original movie by Alfred Hitchcock, the character of  Lisa Fremont, who was portrayed by Grace Kelly, was in a relationship with the main character from the start, in Dirturbia, the main character Kale develops a relationship over time in the film with the chacter Ashley  Carlson, played by Sarah Roemer. Both these female character in both films will be the investigators of the crimes as the main characters are forced to stay at their house.

Some of these similarities caused a lawsuit from the owner of the right of novel in which Rear Window was based, "It had to be Murder". The judge resolved the lawsuit ruling that Disturbia did not steal Rear Window's plot. My recomendation is to watch them both, as they are both films of their times.

They are definetly directed at different audiences, and they are for sure not comparable, as they did not aim for the same goals.

You can read about the lawsuit ruling here