North By Northwest
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Movie Reviews of North By Northwest
Movie Review: So enjoyable
Summary: 5 Stars
You know from the moment you see Saul Bass's marvellous opening credit sequence that this is going to be a great movie. Add Bernard Herman's classic music score and you are immediately on a great rollercoaster of a film.
Hitchcock gets his cameo role out of the way early then Cary Grant enters. At the time he was 55, but no-one ever look better at this age than Grant. Of course he is mistaken for somebody else and the film lifts off. James Mason, Eva Marie Saint and many others play great supporting roles. There are many famous sequences, the crop spraying, the fight on Mount Rushmore its all very well done, cleverly written and directed with Hitchcocks usual style and wit.
This was the first film I ever saw on DVD and I was amazed by the quality of the film. The film dates from 1959 but doesn't show it.
The extras are very good on this disc. There is full commentary by the screenwriter Ernest Lehman and a 39min documentary. In truth you could watch the film without the commentary, then with the commentary and then watch the documentary and start all over again.
Movie Review: Problems With NBNW Disc Is With Mastering, NOT with DVD...
Summary: 5 Stars
I noticed a number of reviews complaining about "bad discs", and saying the problem occurred in the auction house scene. Recently, I had a chance to see NBNW on cable TV in Europe. Right at the auction house scene the picture snapped from anapmorphic to 1:33. Manually resetting the aspect ratio worked for a few seconds, then it snapped back to 1:33. Once out of that scene the film held the correct aspect ratio for the rest of the broadcast. Intrigued, I bought a new R2 PAL DVD of the film at a local store. Sure enough, the exact same thing happened at the same place in DVD playback. All these complaints based on problems right at the same point in the film must be due to an error in the original transfer or mastering, as it seems the transfer, in whatever medium, whether on disc or on TV broadcast, is sending some sort of aspect ratio or film/video flag glitch to the display of the poor viewer. The PAL version of the film is anamorphic 16:9, whereas I think the US NTSC version is a letterboxed 1:33, but both have in common synch or playback problems reported at exactly the same point in the film.Movie Review: A snapshot of a different filmmaking era
Summary: 5 Stars
I've noticed something about Alfred Hitchcock thrillers. They really aren't that thrilling. But they do have genuine class.
I won't summarize the plot of this one. I will say though that the pacing is leisurely, the story interesting, the performances all strong. I particularly liked Martin Landau. And James Mason has a voice that makes everything he say sound like Shakespeare.
But who I really love is Cary Grant. Man, that guy was one cool cat. Even when he's being hunted by spies, he's still relaxed and continental and witty. I would've given the movie 4 stars but Landau, Mason, and Grant push it easily into five.
If you don't need a car chase or gun fight every five minutes then this is a very good movie. It doesn't always make sense. I mean, who would use a cropduster-mounted machine gun to kill a guy when you could just drive by and shoot him? But who cares. It's got style, class, and some very witty dialogue.
But more importantly, it's got Cary Grant. He's so cool.
Movie Review: An All-Time Great Mystery-Thriller
Summary: 5 Stars
Note: Your "helpful" votes are appreciated. Thanks
"North by Northwest" begins when a man is mistaken for a CIA agent. He is soon caught up in deadly chase all over the country. It ends, of course, with the famous scenes on Mount Rushmore.
I'll keep my review short. Longer reviews are best read after seeing the movie. Nevertheless, I would note that I was surprised at all the sexual innuendo in this movie. I wasn't offended, but Hitchcock was way ahead of its time on that score. The two lovers were really hot.
I think we show too much nowadays and loose some of the mystery of sexual encounters. Just talking around a subject can be very sensual.
I would also recommend "Vertigo," by Alfred Hitchcock. This is one of the ten best movies ever made--very compelling.
Alfred Hitchcock The Masterpiece Collection - Psycho / The Trouble With Harry / The Man Who Knew Too Much / Vertigo (DVD)
Movie Review: Cliffhanger
Summary: 5 Stars
Certainly one of the great classics of alltime and proof positive that they don't make movies like this anymore! From the instant when the dazzling 3-D artdeco credits appear, we're onboard for the ride of our lives, actually the lives of hero Cary Grant (1904-86) and Eva Marie Saint. The plot of this 100 percent attention-keeper thickens as its characters sicken. Notable in the glorious cast are the handsomely ignoble James Mason (remember him? 1909-84) and ever-dapper Leo G. Carroll (who later played the ghost in the TV series Topper). Superbly angled cinema shots feature lush hotel interiors - the elegant UN - an aerial shot of ant-tiny Cary Grant in existential torment against desolate grasslands - and closeups of Mount Rushmore, which Hitchcock had dreamt of shooting, here becoming a backdrop of life-and-death drama. Of the 50-some films of Sir Hitchcock (1899-1980) I'd rate this in the top three, with Psycho and Rebecca rounding out the bases.