During this little movie blogging adventure of mine I have tried to do something that most people refuse to do when discussing any type of art form; interject some honesty and talk about how I interpret these films rather than how I am expected to interpret them. In some cases it has forced me to be harsh on movies that I really love (“King Kong,” “The Gold Rush” and “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” for example) but at least I know I wasn’t just telling people what they wanted to hear. Unfortunately, when it comes to “North by Northwest” I would be grasping at straws to find anything but good things to say about it.
I’ve always heard Alfred Hitchcock referred to as the “Master of Suspense” but hadn’t been able to fully appreciate his gift with the first two films on the list “Vertigo” and “Rear Window.” While those films impressed me and both contained their share of dark and scary moments, I was never on the edge of my seat the way I think I should be for true thriller. “North by Northwest” changed all that. In the other two Hitchcock films I mentioned you have a pretty good idea as to what is going on about halfway through. “N x NW” on the other hand keeps you guessing til the end.
When the iconic MGM Lion showed up on the screen I thought I was going to have to return the TV we just bought (well, ask my wife to return it since she paid for it) because the iconic MGM Lion was all green. As the opening credits roll though, the green color fades to the back and the screen takes the form of an air-traffic control grid or a surveyor’s map- apropos since traveling will become something of a recurring theme in this film. Some very well constructed “hustle and bustle” shots of Manhattan jump around busily like the city itself leading up to the moment where we meet our protagonist Roger Thornhill (Cary Grant).
Roger is a Madison Avenue ad executive who behaves exactly like you would expect a Madison Avenue ad executive to behave; he has a regimented way of life, piles his own bullshit tasks onto his assistant and is generally obnoxious- even going so far as to con a man out of a taxi by telling him his assistant is sick then justifying his actions by saying he did the man a favor by making him feel like a Good Samaritan. Yet for all his bullying and domineering, Roger is clearly still very powerless over his mother, who he repeatedly mentions both having to check in with and take to the theater that night.
His plans are sidetracked however after a case of mistaken identity. When drinking with some associates, Roger is abducted by a pair of generic goons who believe he is a man named Mr. Kaplan. Given the fact that he is most certainly NOT Kaplan (in fact, we will later find out there IS no Mr. Kaplan) the attempts to interrogate Roger do not yield very good results. Frustrated, the stooges give up and decide to kill him and make it look like an accident by pouring industrial quantities of bourbon into him, putting him in the driver’s seat of a car and stranding him on a treacherous Oceanside highway. Throughout the film it is implied that Roger has a drinking problem and as a result I think it is subtly implied that Roger survives this drive because he has driven drunk more than once in his life. There are some excellent point-of-view shots of the car careening down the highway and narrowly missing other cars, bicyclists and of course rocky drop-offs which make this scene thrilling and even a little scary.
“I'm an advertising man, not a red herring. I've got a job, a secretary, a mother, two ex-wives and several bartenders that depend upon me, and I don't intend to disappoint them all by getting myself "slightly" killed!” (Roger Thornhill, “North by Northwest”)
Embarrassed by his subsequent DUI, angry that his name has been dragged through the mud and most of all looking for validation Roger begins an exhaustive search for the truth that leads him back to the house where he was interrogated, the hotel where he was kidnapped and eventually the United Nations Headquarters in search of the man he has been led to believe is his captor. Instead, he is a respected UN delegate- leaving Roger confused and back at square one.
The inept assassins who have followed Roger to the UN Headquarters fail again at trying to eradicate him by throwing a knife that ends up killing the delegate instead. This does end up being fortuitous for the bumbling villains as it appears Roger murdered the delegate and is now a bona-fide fugitive. A stunning aerial shot hundreds of feet above the UN Headquarters shows a tiny speck that is Roger running towards a waiting taxi. This shot by itself is packed with artistry; not only suggesting the insignificance of Roger Thornhill in the grand scheme of the planned series of events but it also signifies how Roger has literally stumbled into something so much bigger than himself and all the while enhancing the repeated theme of pursuit and travel.
After Roger makes his big escape the focus shifts to a meeting of what appears to be some sort of US Intelligence Agency. They discuss the remarkable luck their organization has found in Thornhill. Their conversation explains the entire scenario from the first third-person perspective we are able to see up to this point. The men who abducted Roger were foreign spies attempting to smuggle important microfilms containing Government documents to an unnamed country; though with all the references to espionage and national security there is no doubt at least some Cold War implication is there. Since Roger is not their actual secret agent, he serves as a real-life decoy, which the made up Mr. Kaplan was meant to be all along. With shocking detachment the group unanimously decides that, for the greater good, Roger must be the fall guy.
While fleeing for Chicago on a train, Roger runs into Eve Kendall (Eva Marie Saint) who knowingly shelters him from authorities but is secretly working for the foreign agents- or so it seems. As it turns out she is actually the secret agent the US authorities referred to earlier posing as a conspirator and the girlfriend of Vandamm, the leader of the foreign spy contingent. This is a device that seems to be a calling-card of sorts for Hitchcock- the blonde total package female heroine. Eve’s overtly glamorous outfits and double-entendre-laden exchanges with Roger on the train are almost enough to suggest a level of objectification bordering on misogyny. However, her eventual acts of courage and frankly badassedness, all make her character quite progressive and almost a sort of precursor to the Angelina Jolie-type modern female action hero. Despite the fact that there is an age difference between Eva Marie Saint and Cary Grant that teeters on creepy, their chemistry onscreen is undeniable.
As legendary and recognized as the “crop-duster” sequence has become (Roger is sent to a remote Midwestern field where the goons are waiting for him in a circling biplane) it is much less intense than it is comical. Not comical because it is badly filmed, it is filmed very technically advanced, but comical because the wannabe assassins STILL fail to do the job. Instead, the plane winds up crashing into a tanker-truck and blowing up. Yet another scenario where the film should have ended there but instead Roger skates by again.
A multitude of twists and turns set the stage for the climactic finale at Mt. Rushmore. Roger finally learns the whole truth and decides to embrace his “Mr. Kaplan” role in order to save the microfilm as well as Eve. The image of Eve and Roger dangling off Mt. Rushmore while being shot at is enough to make anyone afraid of heights and even though they are the good guys, there is a real feeling that they may not make it out alive. By the end of the film, all the major forms of domestic travel have been utilized; planes, trains and automobiles. Also, the ironic inclusion of so many notable American landmarks (Grand Central Station, UN Headquarters, Mt. Rushmore etc) does not go unnoticed in a film with such boldly stated Cold War overtones.
As I mentioned before from a technical standpoint as well as a character and content standpoint “N x NW” is incredibly daring. The stronger female lead, the cinematography and the blatantly overt sexual references to name a few. However what stuck out with me the most was the concept of the everyman being able to step up and be a hero. Roger Thornhill is not physically imposing, nor does he intentionally defy death, but rather he falls ass-backwards into good fortune and in the process manages to do some heroic things. Also the staggering incompetence of the people out to kill him not only add comic relief but also make the subject matter seem less absurd. These are not criminal masterminds and Roger is not a superhero. He’s just a drunk with an awful parent who still manages to make good.
Maybe there is hope for Mel Gibson yet!
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