Thoughts on seeing North by Northwest in the theater

Cafe Society
1

We saw the TCM showing of North by Northwest in a local movie theater. They’re showing it only two days, 4/2 and also 4/5 if you want to catch it.

I hadn’t seen this movie in a theater and thought it would be a good throw-back experience. Years ago we saw Rear Window in a theater, which I really enjoyed.

Some thoughts:

This theater had reclining seats with clear-view stadium seating, unlike its original run in much flatter theaters. A short person like my wife always ended up behind a taller person, so “newer” theaters have much better viewing that they had in 1960. Still, there were people walking in late, past the front row, so we still had some disturbances.

The audience was much older than usual, mostly middle-aged to retired. There were a few people in their 20’s, but no teenagers or younger. The teenagers must have been in the theater next door, showing Logan. You know, the movie with the loud explosions that we could plainly hear.

However, Logan didn’t have a Bernard Herrman score. When that started playing, it really pumped up the adrenaline. Also it sounds much better in a theater than at my home.

The dialog was actually quite quiet in some places; I wish they had the volume up a bit. And it’s a slow movie - too slow for today’s audiences?

I was watching for the special effects. The scenes at Mt Rushmore visitor center were clearly a matte shot; you could see some slight jiggle of the monument in the distance where the wall met the matte, something that’s not noticeable on TV. Climbing on Mt Rushmore is still a hoot.

The best part is the crop duster scene. I knew exactly what was going to happen, but it was still suspenseful - waiting at the empty road, watching the plane in the distance, feeling isolated in a wide-open area. The scene with Cary Grant trying to run from the plane was worth the admission price alone.

If you have the chance - go see it! If you saw it, your thoughts?

2

Years ago (long before VCR), I was reading a book on Hitchcock that had a shot-by-shot analysis of the crop duster scene. I hadn’t seen it, and figured it might be a long time before I did, if at all, so I read the article, which illustrated and described each shot in the sequence.

Then I headed back home. I turned TV and saw they were running North by Northwest. And I had come in just as the crop dusting scene was starting.

Despite having seen every single shot not a half hour before, it was riveting.

Hitchcock was a genius.

3

I first saw it at a local cinematheque screening a few years ago and also noticed the same relatively primitive matte effects. Good thriller, through. Fun to see a very young Martin Landau in an early role.

I later read that the actress who played Cary Grant’s mom is only a few years older than him, and that the cropduster in flight is a different kind of plane from the wreckage that we later see on the ground.

4

The effect is somewhat undercut if you’ve actually seen the monument and realized that below the faces is a 500 foot near-sheer drop, so the heroes weren’t really going anywhere. It not like you could hop off Washington’s chin and run to the tourist center.

Also, it’s pretty unlikely anyone would have a private home and airstrip on top of the mountain, but hey… it’s a movie.

5

I’m excited to find out about this. I love seeing these old movies in the theater. My first experience with this was Lawrence of Arabia, and it’s still a highlight of my movie-going life (and one of my favorite movies). We saw *Casablanca *a few years ago.

*NbNW *has one of my favorite lines from any movie:
[QUOTE=Cary Grant]
How does a girl like you get to be a girl like you?
[/QUOTE]

Said with that impeccable Cary Grant accent.

6

One of my favorites, for lots of reasons.

You say that the matte shots on Mt. Rushmore don’t hold up – you can see matte lines (and you’ve become more sophisticated since you first saw it, I suspect). But were you aware of the many matte painting used in the film? They blend right in. The interior of the United Nations building when Thornhill first arrives is one. The many different angles of Van Damm’s Frank Lloyd Wright-esque house are all paintings, as is the reverse view to the airfield, with its blinking lights. The dramatic shot downwards from the top of the UN building as Thornhill flees is, too, but you must have figured out that it’s a special effect, because how else could Hitchcock have gotten it?

The screenwriter, Ernest Lehman, also wrote the script for Hitchcock’s last film, the 1976 Family Plot. There are some similarities, including the almost-killed-in-the-car-hurtling-downhill. But the effects are, sadly, not even up to 1950s standards, let alone 1976 standards. A year later George Lucas’ Star Wars would be exhibiting the sort of state-of-the-art effects and camera moves that Hitchcock had been noted for. Still, it’s otherwise not a bad film.

7

Not meant to troll, but this was one of the first movies I saw that impressed upon me that I just wasn’t a “film” guy.

I’ve gone through periods where I’ve tried to read up on and watch “classic” films, but something in me prevents me from appreciating NxNW and many others. I knew that cropduster scene was supposedly a classic, but I kept thinking, you don’t outrun an airplane! :smack: Mainly impressed on how nice it must have been for certain classes to travel in those days.

The best I can do is appreciate most older film as historic relics, rather than enjoyable entertainment.

Probably shouldn’t hit submit. Don’t mean to suggest you oughtn’t enjoy it. Mainly wish I could myself.

8

I missed it on the big screen this past weekend but I watched the Blu-ray a couple of weeks ago. Great movie. I always get a chuckle at the train tunnel scene at the very end.