North By Northwest is the Hitchcock film that many say was the middle child in his career. Bookended by his most notable films, Vertigo and Psycho, North By Northwest is a picture that is often over looked today, yet was one Hitchcock’s most successful and notable films. Ranking number 55 on AFI’s top 100 Best films of all time, it was also named the 7th best mystery film of all time.
The plot follows a New York advertising executive, Roger O. Thornhill (Cary Grant). He is mistaken for a Mr. George Kaplan, a supposed government agent, and kidnapped by a group of foreign spies. After he is interrogated and almost killed, Thornhill tries to find the real George Kaplan only to be set up by the foreign spies as the murderer of a top-ranked member of the United Nations. Thornhill then goes on the run, traveling across the United States by train where he runs into beautiful blonde Eve Kendall (Eva Marie Saint). In Chicago, she delivers a message to Kaplan that almost costs Thornhill his life when a crop-dusting plane chases him across a cornfield. Thornhill soon learns that he is not safe anywhere he goes and decides to find the people responsible for setting him up, to expose them for who they are and to try to clear his name. The film’s conclusion takes place on top of Mount Rushmore in one of the most memorable conclusions in cinematic history.
It is no secret that Alfred Hitchcock is my favorite director of all time. I was first exposed to Hitchcock’s films such as The 39 Steps, Psycho, Vertigo and my favorite film of all time Rear Window during a cinema studies class I took my junior year of high school. I spent a lot of my time in college researching the man for the many film classes I took. North by Northwest was the first of Hitchcock’s films that I viewed in my first college film class, and it instantly became one of my favorites.
Many people know Hitchcock’s name because of Psycho. However, while many would automatically pigeonhole Hitchcock as a horror director because of films like Psycho and The Birds; many people don’t realize that he was not dubbed the master of suspense because of those two films, but rather the films he made previous to the Psycho years. North by Northwest is one of those films that we rarely get to see. It is, in my opinion a perfect film. Perfectly written, directed and, of course, perfectly cast and superbly acted.
North By Northwest is probably most known in the industry as the film that made great use of visual effects and set design. Hitchcock could not get permission from the United States Government to film scenes in the United Nations building or on Mount Rushmore which required him to build full sets in the studio. On one set alone, he planted over a hundred trees to replicate the forest surrounding Mount Rushmore. Hitchcock even built the interior of the United Nations building while sending a cameraman with a hidden camera to the real U.N. building in New York to shoot exterior shots. When you watch the film, you really learn to appreciate how well the film is put together with the visual effects technology of the time.
The 50th Anniversary edition Blu-ray disc presents the film for the first time in 1080p High Definition and includes features such as commentary with screenwriter Ernest Lehman, a new documentary which reveals The Master of Touch: Hitchcock’s Signature Style, Acclaimed Feature-length profile of Cary Grant: A Class Apart. A Documentary titled North by Northwest: One for the Ages, Destination Hitchcock: The Making of North by Northwest hosted by Eva Marie Saint, a Music only Audio track, and Trailer and still gallery. The disc also comes with a 44 page production booklet as well.
Words cannot express how great I think this film is. Alfred Hitchcock was a master filmmaker. He had a great eye for the camera and there will never be another filmmaker like him. North by Northwest does have some minor flaws for which the studio is to blame, such as dubbing over an Eva Marie Saint line, in which she originally talked about making love to a man in a very revealing subtext, as well as a few unnoticeable continuity errors. However, it is still one of the best-crafted films to ever be printed on celluloid. The film also features a very young Martin Landau. You can’t call yourself a fan of Hitchcock’s work if you haven’t seen North By Northwest. It’s one of the greatest achievements of the master’s career. The Blu-ray disc is well worth the buy and the film never gets old.
– Horror Bob
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- Interview with Director Stevan Mena (Malevolence) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Screenwriter Jeffery Reddick (Day of the Dead 2007) - January 22, 2015
- Teleconference interview with Mick Garris (Masters of Horror) - January 22, 2015
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- Interview with Writer/Director Nacho Cerda (The Abandoned, Aftermath) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Actress Thora Birch (Dark Corners, The Hole, American Beauty) - January 22, 2015
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