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Released by: Warner Brothers
Released on: 11/3/2009
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Cast: Cary Grant, James Mason, Eva Marie Saint, Jessie Royce Landis
Year: 1959
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The Movie:
One of the best films in a filmography filled with excellent entries, North By Northwest is, as others have said, 'the Hitchcock film to end all Hitchcock films.' An innocent man on the run, a foxy blonde, a tense atmosphere and scenes of gripping suspense make this a picture that holds up well even by today's standards, nothing about this film feels dated or antiquated in the least.
The movie tells the story of a man named Roger Thornhill (Carey Grant), a New York City advertising mogul who is kidnapped by a gang of spies who mistake him for a government agent. The spies, lead by Philip Vandamm (James Mason), believe him to be a CIA agent named George Kaplan and eventually he's fingered for a murder he didn't commit. In order to clear his name, Thornhill must find the real George Kaplan and prove that he is who he claims he is. Helped along the way by a beautiful blonde named Eve Kendall (Eva Saint Marie), Kaplan flees as a fugitive to try and find Kaplan in Chicago but of course, things don' t go as planned and soon Thornhill's very life is in jeopardy and he doesn't know who he can trust.
Directed with style and pitch-perfect pacing, North By Northwest also really makes excellent use of its fantastic screen play, which earned writer Ernest Lehman an Oscar Nomination in 1959 (sadly, it didn't win). The 'McGuffins' and red herrings scattered throughout the film really do a great job of keeping the audience on the edge of its seat, guessing whodunit and why as the picture plays out before us. Carey Grant's plays his typical everyman type with class, allowing us just enough sympathy to start pulling for him but not so much that we can't accept him the tougher side of what the roles calls for. With the role having become so iconic over the last fifty years, it's hard to imagine anyone else in the part although interesting enough James Stewart famously wanted the part while MGM wanted Gregory Peck to play the role. Supporting performances from James Mason, Leo G. Carroll, and sultry Eva Saint Marie are welcome additions to the film, and look for a young Martin Landau in an important role here as well.
The film builds beautifully to its conclusion and still has the power to surprise after all these years. The famous set pieces - the crop duster chase and the Mount Rushmore bit - are still impressive as are the unique opening credits sequence designed by Saul Bass. Of course, Bernard Herrmann's hefty instrumental score beautifully compliments the impressive cinematography and the script's (unintentional, according to its writer) themes of distrust and immorality of the era's political climate.
While Hitchcock would elaborate on some of his more obsessive recurring themes with more gusto in other movies, here in North By Northwest it just all comes together. The guy, the girl, the plot, the score, the twists, the turns and the excitement are all delivered flawlessly. It's rare that a film really deserves the 'masterpiece' title but this is one of those cases where a lesser award wouldn't be doing the picture justice. This is a rare film that is just as good as its reputation would have you believe, a film that holds up wonderfully to repeat viewings and that never fails in exciting viewers (or at least this viewer in particularly) every time it plays.
Video/Audio/Extras:
Warner Brothers presents North By Northwest in an excellent 1.78.1 anamorphic widescreen transfer in full 1080p high definition with VC-1 encoding. In short, the transfer is excellent. There's a welcome coat of fine film grain present throughout but no serious print damage to note and the improvement in detail, contrast and clarity compared to previous standard definition DVD releases is instantly noticeable. Blacks are nice and strong while color reproduction look smooth and natural, never too hot and never showing any evidence of blooming. Skin tones look good, very lifelike and never too hot, while detail and texture is strong throughout. There are no noticeable problems with mpeg compression or edge enhancement to complain about. Some have complained that the image here is too dark and compared to the standard definition release it is a bit darker but not at the sacrifice of detail or picture quality. There's no print damage at all to note and the image is smooth, clean and very film-like from start to finish.
The English language Dolby TrueHD 5.1 mix sounds pretty good, spreading out the original mono mix to nice effect without ever sounding over-processed or phony. Dialogue is clean and clear and always free of any hiss or distortion and everything is well balanced and nicely presented. There's some really impressive directional effects spaced throughout the film (the crop duster scene is a perfect example) that you'll notice in busier scenes while the film's score sound rich and vibrant. The original English Mono mix is included on the disc in Dolby Digital Mono format (no lossless track, sadly). A standard definition English Dolby Digital 5.1 track is included, as are mono tracks in French, German, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese with subtitles provided in all of the above languages as well as Danish, Finnish, Norwegian and Swedish.
The awesome collection of extras on this release starts off with a commentary track from the film's writer, Ernest Lehman, who shares some fascinating memories of what it was like to work with the Master of Suspense on one of his most iconic pictures. Carried over from the previous DVD release, this track doesn't move at a particularly rapid pace and suffers from a few too many gaps of silence but is definitely worth listening to because when Lehman does pipe up, which is more often than not, his memory is sharp and his stories well worth listening to.
From there we move on to the first of four lengthy featurettes, the fifty-eight minute The Master's Touch: Hitchcock's Signature Style. This is a fantastic primer in all things Hitchcock and a great documentary that goes a long way towards explaining just why so many people hold his films in such high regard. We learn about editing tricks, the importance of beautiful blonde women, humor, elements that make suspense effective and more while inputs from Hitchcock's contemporaries like Martin Scorsese and William Friedkin, among others, attests to his continuing influence on cinema as we know it.
Destination Hitchcock: The Making Of North By Northwest is a forty-minute documentary that is hosted by Eva Marie Saint which also includes input from Hitchcock's daughter, Martin Landau and Lehman. Here we basically follow the construction of the film from start to finish as we learn about the writing, locations, casting and directing of the picture as well as the impact that it had and why it remains such a popular film. This documentary sits nicely alongside its companion piece, the twenty-five minute North By Northwest: One For The Ages piece where Curtis Hanson, William Friedkin, Francis Lawrence, and Christopher McQuerrie all discuss the film, its impact, and its interesting structure and character development.
The fourth and final featurette is the feature length eighty-seven minute long Carey Grant: A Class Apart film that was originally done for PBS. This is a fascinating Biography style piece that covers Grant's life from his early childhood years in England to his immigration to the United States to his trying acid in the sixties through to his passing. There's a lot of great archival photos and clips here as we learn about both his personal life and his professional life through interviews with those who knew him and worked with him throughout the years.
Rounding out the extras are a trailer, a TV spot, a promo bit hosted by Hitchcock, a still gallery, a music only track featuring Bernard Herrmann's score in Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound, animated menus and chapter selection. The whole package is wrapped up in a nice hardcover book featuring forty-three pages of essays and notes on the film. All of the extras are presented in standard definition except the still gallery.
The Final Word:
Warner Brothers has really rolled out the red carpet for Hitchcock's domestic Blu-ray debut. North By Northwest holds up as well as it ever has and it not only looks and sounds amazing but its complimented by a superb array of extra features that are as interesting as they are enlightening. Easily one of the best releases of 2009, this is one that deserves a spot in every film buff's collection.