The third of the three (equal) number 45 entries in the Fifty Best Films of All Time list is the first genuine crowd-pleaser in the top fifty, according to Dan Slevin.
Photo: Warner Bros.
I’m slowly making my way through the Sight & Sound Top 50 and today we get to the first of the glamour clubs in this premier league of cinema.
Alfred Hitchcock has four films in the top 50 and North by Northwest (1959) is the one that provides the most genuine viewing pleasure. There’s no angst, no trauma, nothing problematic, no psychotic violence – just two impossibly attractive humans being chased around some of America’s most iconic locations. It’s about as good as cinematic adventure gets.
Cary Grant – in his fourth and final collaboration with Hitchcock – plays Roger Thornhill, a New York advertising executive without a care in the world. Except for a couple of ex-wives and a rather overbearing mother (Jessie Royce Landis). A case of mistaken identity at a Manhattan restaurant gets him kidnapped, drugged and interrogated by a bunch of cold war spies led by James Mason and Martin Landau.
Photo: Warner Bros.
This is a paranoid thriller that’s light on the paranoia and the thriller and heavy on the light. No one is quite who they seem and the much put-upon Thornhill is increasingly frustrated by his inability to prove to anyone what’s going on, forcing himself into ever more dangerous situations to save his own life and reputation.
In the process he falls for Eva Marie Saint’s Eve Kendall, who may or may not be working for one side or the other. Or one side and then the other.
Some of the most spectacular set-pieces ever filmed feature in the picture – the crop-duster chase in an Indiana cornfield (actually shot in California), a murder in the United Nations Headquarters filmed illicitly because the UN refused to give permission, and the famous chase across the presidential faces of Mt. Rushmore which was the original inspiration for the film itself.
Photo: Warner Bros.
Hitchcock famously hated location shooting but he must have been in a good mood here as there are great many scenes shot at least partially outside a sound stage.
In 2006, GQ magazine called the grey suit that Grant wears throughout the film “the best suit in film history” which surely reflects how well Mr. Grant wore it – or wore anything for that matter. The film’s influence on early Bond – Dr. No was made only a couple of years later – is clear. Dapper hero, glamourous locations and beautiful women. It was to become the template for 1960s cinema.
Photo: Warner Bros.
Re-watching North by Northwest it just feels so modern – the pace and the wit are clearly familiar for today’s audiences – and that’s one of the reasons why the film has resisted the remake process. It’s perfectly fine right now, what could anyone do to it to make it better?
North by Northwest is available as a high-definition digital rental from Apple, AroVision and other outlets. There’s a Blu-ray edition – which looks and sounds stunning – and you can rent that from Alice in Videoland or the 50th anniversary edition DVD from the imperilled Aro Street Video collection. It’s not so easy to find one to buy, unfortunately. Unlike many of Hitchcock’s films we have yet to see a 4K remaster but surely that’s just a matter of time.
Dan Slevin is spending 2023 watching each of the Top 50 Greatest Films of All Time (according to the BFI/Sight & Sound magazine).
