I’ve been on a bit of a Hitchcock binge lately. Two of the movies I’ve rented are Rear Window and North by Northwest, the latter of which I’d now have to consider one of my favorite movies of all time.
Anyway, I don’t understand the titles of either. Rear Window seems to kind of pertain to the plot of the movie, what with all of the peeping tommery. I don’t understand why it’s called Rear Window, though. Can anyone explain?
North by Northwest is the same. Is it because North by Northwest is the general direction Cary Grant’s character travels throughout the movie (from NYC to Mt. Rushmore)? Is there some deeper meaning that I’m missing?
Got any other movie titles that you don’t understand?
Side question: Ever notice the similarity between Snakes on a Plane and Strangers on a Train? I can see why Hitchcock stopped being so blunt. Cary Grant Gets Chased Halfway Across the Country Because He’s Mistaken for Someone Else doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue.
Because it hinges around things he sees through the rear window of his apartment, which faces the street/courtyard/alley/whatever. The front of his apartment is where his front door is, facing the hallway.
OH yeah. I give you No Highway in the Sky. [USA title for the movie No Highway, based on the book of the same name.] I think it’s a very nice turn of phrase, but I have no idea how they arrived at it or decided it made sense.
It’s from the famous incident preceeding the Battle of Lexington and Concord, where Paul Revere told Captain Pulling to hang a number of lanterns in the church window to signal how the British were arriving - one if by land, two if by sea.
It’s an almost universally known story in the US, but I don’t suppose it’s well-known in Australia.
It refers to a line in a poem by American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow*, Paul Revere’s Ride. Revere was one of the riders who spread warning of a coming attack by the British during the American Revolution. Presumably a spotter was to signal him with light from a church tower - one lantern if they approached by land, two lanterns if they approached by sea.
It’s rather well known to Americans, but I imagine essentially unknown elsewhere.
Besides writing poetry, the inspiration for an addition to a little ditty. When someone unwittingly makes a rhyme while speaking, a listener might say “You’re a poet but didn’t know it!” Part two is “But your feet show it, because they’re long fellows!”
Neither do most folks. In a house, you typically have a front door and a rear door, a front yard and a back yard. In an apartment, you usually have the door, and no yard. While some apartments do have rear/back doors, the great majority don’t, and people don’t usually talk about front and rear.
The title of Oleanna - you inspired me to do some googling, since I watched this play once and also didn’t have a clue about the name - appears to be a reference to a Scandinavian folk song and/or story. According to the Tennessee Repertory Theatre Company,
How does that relate to the play? Beats me. One online reviewer suggests that the worthless land is academia, which probably makes as much sense as any other explanation.
Strangers on a Train was the title of the Patricia Highsmith novel on which the film was based. Other Hitchcock titles that came directly from the source material include Rebecca, Psycho, The Birds, Rope, etc.
North by Northwest was written directly for the screen.
Vanilla Sky. This is a double puzzle, because (a) I don’t know what the term ‘vanilla sky’ means, and (b) I don’t know why they decided on that for the title of the movie.
As regards the term, I posted a question about it some time ago here on the Boards, asking what it means and where it comes from, but alas! even the brilliance of the Teeming Millions couldn’t shed much light. It also crops up in a song called ‘Crush’ by Jennifer Paige.
