North by Northwest (1959) First Time Watching! Movie Reaction!!
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- Опубликовано: 16 окт 2024
- North by Northwest (1959)
I'm a big girl.
Yeah, and in all the right places, too...
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This video is for commentary and criticism only and is not a replacement for watching North by Northwest
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Sam and I had a blast watching this movie! Apologies for the delay, the video took an unusually long time to process before I was able to post!
Thank you for all of the support and recommendations!
It's all good Schmitt but cool reaction though, you & Samantha take care.
And yes, that was Alfred Hitchcock that missed that bus
Other classic films; have you seen Casablanca? It's an important film, and I think you should react and watch it.
i have a suggestion for you guys, you should do a reaction video of the classic film 12 Angry Men 1957 with Henry
Fonda.
That was a really fun reaction. Be the first to watch ON THE WATERFRONT (1954). It stars Marlon Brando and Eva Marie Saint (totally different role). Won tons of Academy Awards including Best Picture. Both of you would love it. I can’t believe no one has watched it.🤷🏻♂️
If you loved this movie you must watch Charade. Charade is not directed by Hitchcock but it is a Hitchcock style movie in the North by Norwest way. And the main cast is amazing: Audrey Hepburn, Cary Grant!, Walter Mathau, James Coburn and George Kennedy. And music by Henri Mancini (he did The Pink Panther Theme). And directed by Stanley Donnen. Seriously, you are going to love Charade. Believe me. It's my favorite Hitchcock movie but is not a Hictchock movie!
"Now you listen to me, 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" is still one of the best lines ever written.
*It seems like a slight to WASPs- his being a privileged life devoid of purpose.* Roger even states to Eve that his middle name means nothing, as if it's the number zero.
So so good
"That plane's dustin' crops where there ain't no crops!" is such a funny yokel line. That actor was a regular from New York "Vaudeville" theatre as was Ernest Lehman the screenwriter. The "pay the two dollars" was a running joke of the same.
The most "Cary Grant line" ever!
"two ex-wives and several bartenders that depend upon me"
Cary Grant DID have 2 ex-wives.... and the count would be 5 by the time he died in 1986.
You just have to watch another classic Hitchcock movie with Cary Grant "To Catch a Thief" It's pure gold, just like North by Northwest.
@@Orange-Jumpsuit-Time Those were nasty rumors started by gossip columnist Hedda Hopper, who spread them out of retaliation against Grant, who refused to share gossipy tidbits with her. I wish people would show more class than repeating unfounded rumors. I guess some live petty, empty lives. *cough*
@@Orange-Jumpsuit-Time - Actually if you watch the documentary 'Destination Hitchcock: The Making of North by Northwest' (included as a special feature in most DVD and Blu-Ray releases), Pat Hitchcock (Alfred's real life daughter) says it was Hitch himself that filmed most of the crop dusters sequence in the studio because her father "loathed locations" (because I'm those days you could never control the lighting/daylight, sound/distractions, things getting the the way of shots, the weather, etc), Cary had no objections to that since he worked for Hitchcock several times prior... Hitchcock would often use the interior studio for the majority of his films over the years as much as he could because he had better control over the shooting being the perfectionist that he was (even simulating the outdoors - such as the apartment complex in Rear Window which all done inside the studio and much of Vertigo was in the studio as well using a lot of background exterior plates - in one scene Hitchcock even had Jimmy Stewart walk on a treadmill with a background plate to simulate him walking in the cemetery when it was actually shot inside the studio).
This will be perfect for their next Hitchcock, since they now know both Cary Grant AND Grace Kelly.
Yes!!!
@@Orange-Jumpsuit-Time - Nowadays compared to modern technology, yes they do artificial but back in the day, the 40s, 50s, and even early 60s, they were pretty state-of-the-art back then and the vast majority of audiences back then really didn't notice the differences - as compared to us modern audiences, that are more adept and sophisticated to how things really are supposed to look. I do say (being both a Hitchcock fan and a long time film buff), artificial or not, what Hitchcock was able to do in his films was still very impressive (to which some shots and effects haven't been able to be matched/topped before or since). That is why Hitchcock was such master-class film maker. 🎥
Now, I wonder what people will say in 20, 30, 40, and even 50 years from now regarding our own era modern CGI effects and special effects whatnot? 🤔
There are 4 sections in this movie:
1) The hero doesn't know what 's going on, neither do we, the viewers.
2) We know what's going on (as told by the FBI man), but he still doesn't.
3) He also knows what's going on (as he's been told to continue play the "Kaplan" game), just as we do.
4) He plays a game of its own, but now we don't know where is going! (Maximum suspence!).
As for the famous "middle of nowhere scene",
1) We WANT him to be in trouble (as he supposed to, even if he doesn't know that), so...
2) Hitch puts him, not in some dark alley, but in a place where no obvious danger can be spotted.
3) After a few "is that him/it?", we have our villain: it's the dusting plane - which was there all the time, but suddenly becomes "evil", materialising our desire!
4) Now we got our suspence, but we don't want our hero to die! The problem is, he's totaly defenceless in this environment! So, he 's saved by an extraordinary crash of the plane on the fuel truck! It's not very convincing or realistic, but it does the job: our hero is saved!
What a master Hitch was!
That's funny. That plane's dusting crops where there ain't no crops.
Eve (Eva Marie Saint) is still alive and about to turn 98 on July 4th. Cary Grant was a legend. Phillip Vandamm (James Mason) was also a legendary actor,
And she played Martha Kent in Superman Returns.
James Mason was such a huge actor in the 1950s and early 1960s. It is very shocking that today most people don’t know who he was. His voice alone is so distinctive.
@@AutoPilate And she played Lois Lane in the Adventures of Superman serial.
@@vilefly you’re thinking of Noel Neill, who played Lex Luthor’s wife in Superman Returns, who he married just for her money and her yacht.
@@AutoPilate Drat. Foiled again!
"Pay the $2" was a saying which meant that sometimes accepting a penalty is better than fighting it.
By the way, the very final shot of the movie was symbolic.
What of? (joke)
@@adaddinsane The train going into the tunnel was a hint of things to come for Roger and Eve.
You mean symphalic?
@@Dacre1000 lol
Oh my god, you shouldn't have to explain it!! Generations.sigh..
"We're going to have to look up what microfilm is." Now I'm feeling my age (ha ha!). This is a great movie. Check out "Arsenic and Old Lace" (1944) with Cary Grant and "Heaven Can Wait" (1978) with James Mason. Both are good comedies.
Yes, definitely Arsenic and Old Lace, a favorite of mine. "Where'd you get that face, Hollywood?"
Insanity runs in my family. It practically gallops.
@@DemonBoy3223 "CHAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGEEEEEEE!"
You aren't feeling your age. I grew up on 30s-60s classics from age 8 and on from my grandpa who lived through the Depression as a older teen and my aunt. I'm a huge cinephile and at age 33, you'd be hard pressed to find a classic film I hadn't seen at least once if not dozens and dozens of times. Cary Grant is my all-time favorite actor. Adore directors like Hitchcock, George Cuckor, Howard Hawks, Billy Wilder, Leo McCarey, Joseph Manchiweitz (sp?).
These people are my age and just seem dumb. Who doesn't know what microfilm is? Little thing called the Cold War? Geez...
"Vertigo" is definitely worth watching. "Rebecca" is also an underappreciated gem.
Rope is a good one too.. it's basically a stage play. It takes place in a single location and the entire movie is a oner.
I Confess is also not one that is well known but one of my favorite Hitchcock films.
Vertigo is essential.
As is the inspiration for North by Northwest...
The 39 Steps.
The the RESTORED version of Vertigo!
@@charlieeckert4321 High Anxiety? :)
The drunk driving thing is from another era when it was considered a very minor offense. Then came Mothers Against Drunk Driving in 1980 and in a few short years got it turned into a major offense. I remember so many people angrily and loudly complaining that they could drive perfectly well while drunk - better even. Automobile related deaths dropped by nine thousand a year as the campaign achieved success.
also drinking in general was just a huge part of american culture in 1959, even for "respectable" people, that it really isn't anymore. it wasn't until the 70s that society started saying hey maybe everyone from stockbrokers to welders shouldn't be half-loaded all the time. now of course the idea of being anywhere from tipsy to drunk at work (or even just during the day) is bizarre to most people, but for someone like my grandfather getting buzzed at lunch was just part of doing business.
Then came the cell phone and the tablet: auto deaths skyrocketed again, and nobody cares.
I worked with someone who said that they drive better when their stoned / marijuana.
.
Here's a video of him a few years later.
.
Dancing Man Festival Too Kings Lynn
.
m.ruclips.net/video/-Jb5-zD1MGc/видео.html
.
Also when she said pay the 2$ that was sort of still a joke, it would have still been more than that but he can easily pay it either way and it still wasn't serious enough to go to jail like it is today which is kind of crazy
,, watch Bill Hicks Sane Man (1989) 🍻🚙🚓
While the cornfield sequence in this movie is a filmmaking masterclass, no one looked better running on-screen than Cary Grant.
Suck on that, Tom Cruise.
(Please don't kill me.)
Cary Grant undoubtedly looked better, but I've heard "film scholars" say that the crop-duster sequence was the inspiration for the helicopter chase in "From Russia with Love." Who knows?
@@william1611youtube It absolutely was. Just watch how the opening to this video essay cuts between the two sequences: ruclips.net/video/-zR1yTLV_XI/видео.html
@@Wired4Life2 Thank you! I hadn't seen that video before. Fascinating!
I watch this at least once a year. Hitchcock pretty much created the prototype Bond movie. Did you pick up on Leonard being gay? Martin Landau suggested this, to add an extra dynamic into the relationship with Van Damme and Eve.
Also - the metaphorical "train enters tunnel" ending is pure Hitchcock mischief.
The one obvious line Leonard has is at the end when he says to VanDamm, "Call it my women's intuition." It was completely Landau's choice to play him gay and in love with VanDamm. Hitch loved it!
"Something wrong with your eyes?"
"Yes, they're sensitive to questions."
I love that line, lol. This was really fun to watch with you guys!
You guys should react to more Alfred Hitchcock films…
"Vertigo", "The Birds", "Strangers on a Train", "Dial M for Murder", "To Catch a Thief", "Notorious", "Rebecca", "The Man Knew Too Much", "Rope", "Shadow of a Doubt"
🎥🍿
The birds is one of my all time favourites
add The 39 Steps
Love Notorious and Rebecca!
And don't forget, Strangers on a Train.
Lifeboat (1944) is a good one, too.
Bernard Herrmann wrote many of Hitchcock's classic scores, and is regarded as one of Hollywood's finest composers. Scorsese was thrilled to get him for Taxi Driver.
The score is available in Apple Music.
That was his last score.
The saxophone is what gives this movie its gritty grime. Excellent score.
@@timroebuck3458 Psycho was after this
I have the taxi driver Lp and love it.
Cary Grant was completely lost on the plot of this movie while making it, and he was certain the movie would bomb, though it came out to great acclaim.
(And his gray suit is an iconic piece of cinema history.)
Vertigo has an iconic gray suit too, but this time on the female protagonist
One movie I wouldn't want you to overlook is 1963's Charade (also with Cary Grant). It's not Hitchcock, but really feels like it could have been. Very fun and twisty. If you do a Cary Grant poll it should be on it.
Also, fun fact: Cary Grant's real name was Archibald Leach. A name so bad, that John Cleese borrowed it for his character in the movie A Fish Called Wanda. (Another really good movie.)
"Charade" nails the Hitchcock vibe very well. Great recommendation.
"Archibald Leach" is on par with "Donovan Leitch," as far as I can tell.
@@Otokichi786 in his girl Friday grant is arguing on the phone with a guy named Archie leach
The same people who made charade made a follow up movie called arabesque. It’s nearly the same but Cary grant had other contract commitments and couldn’t be in it So they got Gregory peck. The director kept telling peck to be funnier and he would say “ I’m NOT Cary grant”
Charade is so good.
When I was a child I visited Mt. Rushmore and I remember being in the exact same visitor's area with those HUGE windows. I also remember that there was some talk between my parents about this was a location where a certain movie was shot. I didn't realize it was this movie until I saw it on TV as a young adult.
I’ve seen it when I was a child. I loved It. So iconic. And the music of Bernard Hermann is so great. It was my introduction to Hitchcock’s works. And I have seen all his films since.
Fun little detail: At 29:16 you can see my favorite movie blooper of all time. Look at the little boy in the middle right side of the frame. In the unedited film, you can see him bring his fingers up to cover his ears. This was obviously not the first take of this shot and he didn't like how loud the gun was, so he did something about it before the gun was fired.
One more kind of fun detail: The two final shots in the film were him pulling her up into bed and then a train going into a tunnel. In an interview, Hitchcock made it clear that final shot was a tongue-in-cheek sexual metaphor.
Also, Cary Grant is holding the knife pointed down after the UN murder; in the next shot, he's holding it point UP.
The Philadelphia Story and His Girl Friday are some other great Cary Grant films you should check out. Great reaction as always!
"Arsenic and Old Lace"
@@jean-paulaudette9246 Definitely, one of my favorite movies.
@@mortimerbrewster3671 You're not a Brewster! You're the son of a sea cook!
@@jean-paulaudette9246 🤣🤣🤣🤣
@@jean-paulaudette9246 Chaaarrrrgggeeeee!
I'm so excited for your future viewings. Not only are there so many fantastic Hitchcock movies, but you haven't even scratched the surface of brilliant old/classic movies. Like this one, the greats have aged wonderfully. Still riveting for one reason or another to this day.
Thanks for reacting to North by Northwest. One of my all time favorites!
I suggest "The Time Machine" from 1960!
While brainstorming, Hitchcock told screenwriter Ernest Lehman he wanted the villains to attack Thornhill in the middle of nowhere with a tornado. The crop duster was his response.
Samantha: 🤣"I called it! You called her a b*tch!"
TBR Schmitt: 😳"I would never say something like that!"
That exchange at 28:39 had me rolling!
Nice to see another classical film here. I know many of us have a natural tendency to avoid movies "before our time" but there really is a gold mine of worthwhile films in virtually every era of cinema whether they be known classics or hidden gems. Very impressed by the range of release years in your poll and look forward to seeing more like this along with the usual stuff.
More reactors should steer away from just doing franchises and the usual round of movies and actually dig deep into cinema history, even the world of low budget and independant filmaking to see some gems few people talk about.
As a Turner Classic Movies announcer said: "A classic movie is one you haven't seen yet." So TCM is part of the level one Premium cable TV package on Spectrum. With TCM Imports, I've traveled all around the world, to places Hollyweird hasn't hear of/are too scared to visit.;)
This was the classic 'mistaken identity' plot, it basically started here and Hitchcock already mastered it.
And it was basically a Bond movie before James Bond became a thing.
I'd like to separate the eras of cinema into double-decades by technologies:
1890-1910 Experimental era (George Meliés "Voyage dans la lune")
1910-1930 Silent era (Chaplin "Gold Rush", Lang "Metropolis", Murnau, etc.)
1930-1950 Talkies era (Hitchcock and the "Silver screen" age)
1950-1970 Technicolor era (The "Golden age", monumental movies like Ben Hur, Gone With The Wind, Lawrence of Arabia …)
1970-1990 Blockbusters era (new cameras & steadicam like "Bullitt", and special effect driven movies, Spielberg's "Jaws", Lucas "Star Wars", )
1990-2010 Digital era (CGI "Jurassic Park", "Lord of the Rings", color grading "O Brother wee art thou", "Pleasantville")
2010- Streaming era (cinematic universe and superhero oversaturation while opening directly Video-on-demand …)
I think this was also an influence on The Fugitive TV series that would run in the 60s.
@@WhiskyCanuck The Fugitive itself spawned a lot of "man on the run" shows: The Incredible Hulk, The A-Team and lots of smaller ones.
TBR watched the movie remake not long ago.
2020. Garbage era. Humanity has run out of ideas and everything is a reboot or has been done before.
Gone With The Wind was in the '30s, Bullitt in '68, but mostly I agree.
I think the '40 and early '50s was the noir era.
@@Cau_No don't forget 🐶 the littlest hobo (1979-1985) starring London 🎶 there's a voice, that keeps on calling me ✨😏
Hitchcock was so good. Even his earliest low budget movies in the end of the silent movie era were creative and innovative. Thank you Daniel and Samantha for reacting to North by Northwest! I think you'll enjoy the first "The 39 Steps", which Hitchcock made twice.
Did he do 'The 39 Steps' twice?, I thought it was 'The Man Who Knew Too Much' that was the only film that he did twice....
No, the 39 steps has been made twice, but only once by Hitchcock.
@@georgemorley1029 - I thought so...
Hitchcock is the best director of all time to me. Virtually all of his films are great and watchable. Personally, I can't say the same for other famous directors.
@@drlee2 Kurosawa.
My favourite Hitchcock movie! I was lucky enough to see it my first time on one of Montreal's biggest screens, in the mid-1980s. Oh! That creamy Technicolor look, so smooth and rich!
I was head over heels in love with Hitchcock after Birds, Psycho and North by Northwest but then I watched Vertigo. It shot up to my number 1 movie of all time.
My favorite Hitchcock film. This was a big influence on the early James Bond films. When they initially tried to make a Bond film based on an original script "Thunderball" (which Ian Fleming later turned into a novel) they asked Hitchcock to direct and asked Cary Grant to play Bond. Neither wanted to commit to more than one film and the project fell through (later to be resurrected by the producers of the Sean Connery films). The helicopter sequence in "From Russia With Love" was obviously inspired by the crop duster sequence in this film. Even Hitchcock commented on the similarities.
Another good Hitchcock spy thriller is "The Saboteur". It also involves an ordinary man caught up in espionage and a climax involving a famous American landmark.
Cary Grant would've been a FANTASTIC Bond, imo.
My Favorite Hitchcock movie This and the equally superb Charade (Also Grant and this time Audrey Hepburn led the way to the Bond films. See Charade if you like this. After hearing the end of this and how much you liked it CHARADE is really a must see. It is often sited as the best Hitchcock movie that he DIDN'T direct but it has so much the same pacing, humor, suspense and romance and you never guess the the plot twists ....
I've got "Charade" saved on my phone. One of the most prominent reasons I love "Charade" is the Henry Mancini music!
I always start with 'I'm just gonna listen to the theme song'. But, I end up watching the whole movie.
I usually consider this my favorite Hitchcock film, but it could honestly be tied for 1st with at least 5 or 6 others. A few weeks ago, I got to see Cary Grant & Ingrid Bergman in Hitchcock's 1946 B&W film "Notorious" for the very first time in one of the GORGEOUS old movie palaces in downtown LA (aptly names the Los Angeles theater) which was a great treat, and famed movie critic Leonard Maltin interviewed Grant's daughter for about 10 minutes before the film. I was also lucky enough to see Cary Grant on a speaking tour he did around the country before he died where he talked about his life, working with Hitchcock, and his experiences with LSD. Also, because Hitch was a bit naughty (and in some instances, abusive and manipulative, sadly) the very last shot of the film of the train going into the tunnel was his way of implying that the actors were having sex, but doing it in a way to get around the censors.
That and waves crashing on a beach is a cliche' stand-in.
29:15 One of the most famous goofs in Hollywood history: The boy on the right edge of the screen is covering his ears in anticipation of the bang.
You should do Charade next. Thought to be the most Hitchcock-like movie that Hitchcock didn’t do.
29:17 One of the most famous film goofs, the kid plugging his ears in the background before the gunshot on set.
I am sure you'd also love Casablana, which turns 80 this year, as it was released in 1942, but has a similarly witty and sarcastic lead character (who also has trouble with a woman).
Hitch famously made cameos in a lot of his movies - my favorite is in "Lifeboat" which takes place almost completely in a rowboat. William Bendix is reading a newspaper and Hitch appears in a weight loss add - the "before" and "after" photos are both of him.
Great movie. I think this movie inspired to make the James Bond movies. I think he was offered the role of James Bond before Sean Connery. If you want to see another great none Hitchcock movie with Carry Grant which is considered a Hitchcock movie that Hitchcock never made :) you should see Charade 1963. Also if you have seen allot of Hitchcock movies you should watch High Anxiety. Also another great movie with the guy who plays the bad guy here is Heaven Can Wait 1978.
North by Northwest is essentially a bigger budget retelling of his 'The 39 Steps'. Very similar plot. But yeah, Ian Fleming allegedly based his James Bond character on Cary Grant. Grant was given the role but only wanted to do 1 movie, as he was 58 years young at the time; paving the way for Sean Connery.
@@Kthomasritchie Grant was offered the Bond role and Hitchcock was asked to direct. But this was when there was an early attempt to make "Thunderball", which at the time was an original script and not yet a novel. The producers who later made the Connery films were not involved with the first attempt at making "Thunderball".
@@richardb6260 From what I've read, Fleming reached out to Hitchcock, but Hitchcock wasn't interested. He was done with making spy thrillers and wanted to move on to something different. Hence his next feature being Psycho.
@@Kthomasritchie well, Hitchcock did make the cold war spy thrillers "Topaz" and "Torn Curtain" later in his career. The book I'm reading, "Nobody Does it Better" goes into a lot of detail on the making of the Bond films. Particularly the early ones. They came really close to getting "Thunderball" made in 1958.
Fleming's first choice for Bond was David Niven. Niven would eventually play Bond in the spoof version of "Casino Royale" in 1967.
Charade is awesome! "The best Hitchcock film that Hitchcock never made!"
"Strangers on a Train" and "Notorious" are GREAT!
Amazing masterpiece North by Northwest directed by Alfred Hitchcock starring Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint, James Mason and Martin Landau. Thank you TBR Schmitt great reaction guys excellent😊👍👍👍👍
super fun reaction. it's always great seeing people react to movies older than the godfather. it's a bit older hitchcock, but i really recommend shadow of a doubt, a thriller with joseph cotten that's remarkably dark for its time. and speaking of cotten: citizen kane, if you haven't already seen it.
Movies older than Lawrence of Arabia would be more correct.
The "I never discuss love on an empty stomach" line was dubbed due to censorship. It was originally "I never make love on an empty stomach." Which makes the follow-up line even better.
What was the follow up line
@@vickjr98Roger says "You've already eaten", and Eve replies "But you haven't". Now that's an innuendo.
The line, "I never discuss love on an empty stomach." had been edited for the censors. Watch her lips. "I never MAKE LOVE on an empty stomach." was the script.
Hopefully you react to the others on the classic poll! Duck Soup and Double Indemnity are favorites of mine. Also Cary Grant is great and Bringing up Baby with him and Katharine Hepburn is incredible!
The man playing Leonard is the great Martin Landau. He played Bela Lugosi in Ed Wood and earned an Oscar for it!
My favorite of Hitchcock movies, I saw Cary Grant at a speaking event at SMU in Dallas in the early 80s or so, huge fan of his, thanks again for sharing your thoughts and reaction
"Pay the $2.00" is an old axiom. It refers to not contesting, and just paying for the ticket, and having it over with.
Such a superb film, with so many iconic set pieces and with a fabulous score by legendary composer Bernard Herrmann. ETA You don't know what microfilm is? Lord, the younger generation have lost so much information. lol
I don't know, I'd be estatic to never have to search a microfilm or microfiche archive for the rest of my life...
@@missk8tie But at least you know what it is. lol
One thing to think about is how great Cary Grant’s suit is through all this.
Hitchcock’s gimmick of appearing in all his films is quite fun. One of the best is the WWII film “Lifeboat.” The story is about survivors of a u-boat attack in the Atlantic. Hint: Hitchcock was not one of the survivors.
James Mason was pretty controversial as an actor. He took the “Oxford Oath” prior to WWII and kept his word. The scene in the study when the drapes are closed, the room goes dark, the table lamp is turned on, the room is illuminated but Vandamm’s face is dark is pretty special.
An innocent man, wrongfully accused is a major Hitchcock theme. The 39 Steps is pretty dated and others directors have liberally helped themselves to the techniques but it is worth seeing how the OG pulled it off.
I also like how the camera moves in a circular motion along with Mason and Grant, who are watching each other, before Mason draws the curtain.
This is probably my favorite Hitchcock film, it’s a split hair difference between this and Rear Window
Fun Fact: In restaurant scene at Mount Rushmore you can see a kid in the background covering up his ears right before the gun goes off. It's one of those moments where an extra ruins a scene. Once you've seen it becomes a distraction the next time you watch it.
Aaaah... "North by Northwest" with Cary Grant and the wonderful Eva Marie Saint... Full of fun and so enjoyable... Always a pleasure to see it.
34:21 "We're gonna have to look up what microfilm is." That sentence makes me feel damn old.
I love seeing how much you guys appreciate the classics. Especially how you don’t let certain dated aspects of the filmmaking (like rear projection for driving scenes) affect your appreciation of the movie. A lot of younger reaction channel hosts struggle with the pacing and different styles of acting, among other things, but you guys manage to connect with the films and appreciate the qualities these movies possess that have become altogether lacking in modern cinema. Writing and character were paramount and it’s typically on rich display in Hitchcock films, but certainly not specific to his films, in that era. You’ll find that most of the great, classic films have such wonderful, sharp dialogue and compelling characters right down to the bit parts. (A benefit of the old studio system and it’s contract players. There was a character actor for every type needed and every movie could be stocked with the perfect fit for even the smallest roles. These character actors would be as identifiable to audiences of the time, for a certain type of role, as Cary Grant and Jimmy Stewart would be in the lead.) That kind of craft has become something of a lost art. Movies just seemed smarter and classier back then. If you want another great Eva Marie Saint movie, I’d recommend “On the Waterfront”. Which will, of course, bring you to young Marlon Brando.
The opening scene is Alfred having the bus door slammed in his face......AWESOME!!!
TBR: "Eve, you b***h". Same viewing, "I would NEVER say something like that". 😂😂
My dad was a taxi driver in Chicago for several years and he absolutely had the occasional passenger asking him to lose people who were following them. He got good at it too!
(Great reaction, guys. I've never seen anyone react to this one! So glad to have found your channel :D)
1:54 Good. Everyone should do that in their lifetime. I've not so hardcore as to go back to the silent movies, but I have done sort of a binge of old-school stuff with the OG King Kong probably being the oldest one.
I know you mentioned it at the end of the video, but you looked like you were both having so much fun here. :) Yay, that was nice to see.
This movie was a huge influence on the the style of the second James Bond movie From Russia With Love from 1963. The actor playing the FBI guy (aka The Professor) was Leo G. Carroll and went on to play Alexander Waverly in 60's spy series The Man From U.N.C.L.E., the head of the U.N.C.L.E. organisation. And the actor playing Leonard was Martin Landau who became a regular character in the first few seasons of the original Mission Impossible TV series. So this film has quite a strong connection and influence over the whole 60's spy genre.
Really loved your reaction. As always, the analysis after the movie is a real highlight of these videos.
Another actor who was a regular in a spy/agent series was Edward Platt, the lawyer in drunk driving court scene, who played Chief of Control in "Get Smart" some years later.
@@bjornh4664 Very true. He was in such a brief scene, I'd forgotten he was in the movie. Well spotted.
"Pay the two dollars" is the punchline to an old joke that the audience of the time would have been familiar with; you could probably google it. His mother is essentially telling him to quit while he's ahead instead of digging himself deeper.
Just a few fun facts from Hitchcock's biography:
Hitchcock first had the basic plot in his head for about 5 years before making it. He always wanted the climax to be on Mt. Rushmore and Cary Grant dangling from the nose of one of the President's. He had the working title of 'The Man in Lincoln's Nose' before changing to 'From a Northwesterly Direction' and finally the actual title.
He was denied access to both the U.N. building and Mt. Rushmore due to concerns over the subject material. So he had both sets recreated at the MGM lot. To get the shot of Cary Grant walking into the U.N. building, Hitchcock hid in a truck while instructing his cinematographer how to shoot. That's real footage of Cary Grant walking up the steps in plaun view. It'd be like if George Clooney just up and walked up the steps in broad daylight with no crew around. There's a guy who does a double take in that scene and that's a real reaction to seeing one of the biggest stars out of nowhere.
Although Vertigo is remembered as his greatest in the eyes of many film critics and audiences today, Hitchcock felt he'd been too serious in the subject matter and desperately wanted to do an escapist story to refresh himself. He was right to, as this was a box office hit almost immediately. 3 years before the 1st Bond movie even.
If I'm remembering an NPR interview with Eva Marie Saint correctly, she said that she actually hurt her elbow while filming the sequence on Mt Rushmore... I want to believe one angle of her being filmed shows her in genuine pain
A couple of good movies with James Mason in it are: Heaven Can Wait (with Warren Beatty) and The Verdict (with Paul Newman).
...and obviously Kubrick's Lolita.
Don't forget "20,000 Leagues Under The Sea"
And The Desert Fox, and Julius Caesar, and 20000 Leagues Under The Sea, and Journey To The Center O The Earth, and Lolita and The Fall Of The Roman Empire and so on and so on...
Mason started making movies in the 30s, and those are probably more worth watching than many others. In any case, one of the best ever
Sam Peckinpah's Cross Of Iron.
"Pay the two dollars" is a reference to an old vaudeville comedy bit where a lawyer continues to fight escalating fines and LOSING. It's a bit like saying, "Just pay the fine and GO HOME."
Classic movie. Hope you two are having an great and awesome day ❤
The luminous Eva Marie Saint is still with us in her late 90s. Catch her in her award winning role in "On the Waterfront".
Leonard was played by Martin Landau, who is probably most famous for the Mission: Impossible TV show in the 60s. He was also the father of Juliet Landau, who was Druscilla in Buffy the Vampire Slayer and looks almost exactly like her dad.
Juliet Landau's mom is Barbara Bain. Martin's colleague from Mission Impossibe. Landau and Bain were also together on Space:1999
Juliet had also a little role in Tim Burton's "Ed Wood", which her father got an Academy Award for starring as Bela Lugosi, the 'original' Dracula.
Talk about connection games with movies …
'To Catch A Thief' is another great Alfred Hitchcock/Cary Grant movie, which also stars Grace Kelly . . . you will like it.
Movies of Hitchcock really worth watching:
The 39 steps (His best of his early British period)
Shadow of a doubt (his favorite of his movies)
Notorious
Strangers on a train
Rope
Rebecca (based on the novel by Daphne DuMaurier and won the Oscar for best picture)
Dial M for Murder
The man who knew too much (the 1956 version)
Vertigo
The Birds (also based on a novel by Daphne DuMaurier)
Also if you could do my favorite Kubrick film Paths of Glory
I feel old: The Schmitts never heard of microfilm. For us old folks, it was the public library's Google.
Cary Grant was one of the biggest stars of all time. He made a few films with Hitchcock including "To Catch a Thief". and yes, Hitch made cameo's in his films
Yep, that was Hitch trying to get on the bus. He does a small cameo like that in most of his films.
This one is just so much fun from start to finish. This has been a lifelong favourite of mine. That crop-dusting scene is probably one of the most well known examples of classic Hollywood cinema. Such fun. Sidenote - Back when I was in highschool and Internet was a pretty new thing my library still had microfilm readers. It was exactly what you described it as, a little reel of 16 or 35mm film and it would have copies of newspapers, photographs, documents, you name it.... Also microfiche, same thing on flat sheets of film. Libraries had machines you could sit at and scroll through. Research papers used to take sooooo long.
Love North by Northwest. I love Cary Grant anyway. He was so good in this. Hitchcock always has interesting stories and characters in his movies. I loved that this took place by Mt. Rushmore too. James Mason (Van Damm) usually plays a bad guy and he was good in this. Martin Landau, Leonard (played in the tv series Mission Impossible) and was good here as he found out Eve was an agent. Loved the music too. So glad you enjoyed it. I loved the Birds with the lead as Tippi Hedren. She’s the mother of Melanie Griffith and grandmother of Dakota Johnson. Good reaction. Loved the dialogue too between Roger and Eve. 😀
LOVE THIS ONE!!!! fun movie to watch. Eva Marie Saint is gorgeous and Cary is the man, yo!
This is a perfect movie! Bernard Hermann did the score. Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint, and James Mason, and Martin Landau! The script, the camera work. It's an action, comedy, thriller. The handsomest man on the screen. And the crop duster scene is legendary. (We studied this in film class.)
You should have included The Maltese Falcon in your golden age poll. It's fantastic and it never gets old.
Eva Maria Saint turns 98 on July 4th. Happy Birthday.
In addition to “The Birds” and “Vertigo”, my other favourites to add would be “Rebecca”, “Lifeboat”, “Dial M for Murder” and “The Trouble with Harry”.
The "Trouble With Harry" is his forgotten Masterpiece.
@@garycrow1943 Fully agree. And it’s damned funny!
@@georgespeck7914 His only true comedy
@@garycrow1943 Shirley MacLaine's first film.
Rapid City was not a large town. It had a small regional hospital at that time.
At the restaurant scene at Mount Rushmore if you look closely you can see a young boy holding his ears waiting for the shot. That restaurant is no longer there and has been replaced by a modern cafe.
Great reaction!
idk why but since im working on movies/series/audio projects myself and having released one recently seeing people react to other kind of cinematography art just gives me so much inspiration!
You can never go wrong with Hitchcock. One of those few directors who has a literal catalog of great films. If you two are looking for another poll to do then try having one for Billy Wilder, one of the greatest writer/directors ever. Here's a list of some of his greats: "Double Indemnity" (1944), "Sunset Blvd" (1950), "Stalag 17" (1953), "Witness For The Prosecution" (1957), "Some Like It Hot" (1959), and "The Apartment" (1960).
Cary Grant and his Co star taught a master class in "flirtation " on the train. They were saying "everything " and at the same time saying nothing vulgar. Eve was an excellent character. She was mature and sophisticated and very confident, which all made her very sexy! Great reaction, to a great Hitchcock film.
She originally actually said "I never make love on an empty stomach," but the studio made them change it, considering it too racy for the time. It wasn't reshot, though, just overdubbed, so you can still see her mouth the original line.
@@Corn_Pone_Flicks No. She said, "I never discuss *sex* on an empty stomach" which was too racy for the Code and dubbed to "I never discuss *love* on an empty stomach."
This is one of my favourite movies in my collection. Made the year before I was born. Next you should watch 'To Catch a Thief,' 'Exodus,' and 'Roman Holiday.'
North by Northwest is often listed among the greatest films of all time. It was selected in 1995 for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". After its first screening, reviewers for The New Yorker and The New York Times immediately hailed it as a "masterpiece of comedic, sophisticated self-parody" (Wikipedia). Cary Grant was one of the great leading men from the 1930s to the 1960s; he won a Lifetime Achievement Academy Award, and is one of 20 actors ("Legends of Hollywood") commemorated on a US postage stamp.
I recommend you submit to your patrons "Ben Hur"- one of the greatest Hollywood films of all time (Charlton Heston). So glad that you are open minded to view and enjoy classic films from the past; many of them stand the test of time.
I have a sheet of Cary Grant postage stamps! Grant is also named by the AFI as the 2nd greatest male movie star - after Bogart.
Vertigo is way more heralded.
Sam said "This looks like a painting" at the UN building shot because it is, in fact, a painted shot.
One of my favorite Hitchcock movies! Rope and Rebecca are my favorites! Worth a watch.
Damn, Sam is so good at guessing all these twists. I should keep score of who is better at guessing.
I'm loving how you guys are laughing through this one. Hitchcock purposely made this "light" and "entertaining", as opposed to deep and psychological like his last movie (and his next one: Psycho!). There's all kinds of plot holes but you just go along with it because it's so breezy! Not my all-time fave Hitchcock, but defintiely a fun one!/ Some of the others on your list, very psyched to see you do: the original "King Kong" ab-so-freaking-lutely! And "Sunset Boulevard" is also a great one. Definitely interested to see you guys react to the original "King Kong"!
I know why I don't convey high-likeability to this film - it's those "holes". Or, in this case, The Mother. Why didn't Hitch rewrite her label was His SIster? Because that would have been so much more fitting. That one silly mistake ruins this film for me because I like Jesse Royce Landis so much, and she's so perfect as Grace Kelly's mother in THIEF.
@@BuffaloC305 It´s funnier if it´s his mother. Also a lot of Hitchcock has these themes of dominating mothers(Psycho, Notorious etc.)
@@BuffaloC305 Hitch had an animosity towards “Mother”. See Psycho and Notorious.
@@BuffaloC305 The behavior of his mother, whether you like it or not, is not remotely a plot hole. I swear, nobody knows what that means anymore. A plot hole is logical inconsistency or contradiction in a story, such as a character knowing something they couldn't know, and NOT "This character behaved in a way I don't agree with."
@@Corn_Pone_Flicks spot on
You would love the movie "Laura". It's not an Afred Hitchcock movie but was directed by Otto Preminger, another famous director. It stars Dana Andrews, Jean Tierney, Clifton Webb, with Vincent Price (of horror movie fame) as a playboy. The theme song is haunting beautiful.
Cary Grant awesome as always and Eva Marie Saint as the ultimate femme fatale. Nice turns by James Mason and Matin Landau. And solid character turns by Leo Carroll and Jessie Landis. This is also so stylish and iconic as it travels across America from NY to Chicago to the midwest, to Mount Rushmore.
You mention the color in many of these old movies. The color film technology you are seeing was Technicolor - which allowed for very vivid and rich color, but it was a very expensive technology, which is why so many movies were still made in B&W. By the 1960s Kodachrome color was invented, much more affordable, but the colors were not as good, so you see more color movies, but the color is more mundane.
Alfred Hitchcock at his suspenseful best. It's hard me to choose a particular scene. I guess when Mr. Townsend gets murdered. Especially when Roger Thornhill stands up and immediately gets photographed holding the knife. It's so outrageous.
At 12:58 of your video, y'all question 'who is the agent?'. That's what makes Alfred Hitchcock movies so great. We all want to know who the agent is!
And at 20:20 of your video, is a Greyhound Super Scenic Cruiser. One of my fondest memories is riding one of those buses.
I think were I to suggest a classic movie to react to, it would be:
"Charade" or
"My Fair Lady"
both of those are movies of which I have lost count of how many times I've watched them.
The infamous restaurant scene in 2020’s _The Invisible Man_ reminded me so much of Mr. Townsend’s death scene here.
And, yes, that was Hitch (as he was called) at the beginning trying to get on the bus in the beginning. He's always somewhere in his films.
I'm not sure if other directors did that before him, but he's very well known for his cameos.
This is where M Night Shayamalan got the idea to do cameos for his movies
@@Wired4Life2 Lots of current directors and writers pay homage to earlier films in this way. After all, it's not like younger movie goers will recognize the re-scene
Thank you for watching older movies like this! Some channels refuse to do movies before the 60s saying no one wants to watch them and it makes me sad. Sure not every older movie is great especially when you expect them to look visually like the all CGI all digital films of today but we shouldn't discard them as no longer valuable. Plenty of them are still extremely fun to watch and I'm glad when people give them a chance rather than just dismissing them out of hand because they're old.
I'm so glad you picked this as your next Hitchcock film. It's my personal favorite, and definitely the most "fun" movie he made. NXNW basically build the spy movie template that James Bond movies would copy a few years later. Watching you two react to it made me feel like I was watching it again for the first time. It was a joy to watch you enjoy it.
Another fun fact: In the scene where Eve shoots Thornhill at Mt. Rushmore, just before it happens you can see a kid behind her holding his ears, because he knows what's coming!
Did you notice at 27:34 When they car made the “turn” to the left, Grant had to poke the cop in the ribs to get him to lean over as if they were going around a corner?
James Mason as Phillip Vandamm was amazing. A great Hitchcock film if you want to watch another one is Strangers on a Train.
That is how my dad dressed going to work. My mom would wear gloves and dresses to go to downtown.