Paramount Summer Classic Film Series: North by Northwest and Strangers on a Train

The final installment of Hitchcock week at the Paramount was the pairing of North by Northwest and Strangers on a Train.  This was a fun pair of films to see together.  North by Northwest (1959) screened first.  In the film, Cary Grant plays Roger O. Thornhill, a New York advertising executive.  One day, he is kidnapped by foreign spies who have mistaken him for a man named George Kaplan.  They take him to a mansion, presumably owned by one of the spies.  Thornhill insists that he is not George Kaplan and does not have any of the information the spies are looking for.  For his insolence, they force him to drink entirely too much whiskey and then put him behind the wheel of a car.  He survives the drive down a mountain (barely), but is taken into police custody for drunk driving.  Due to his drunken state, the police do not believe his story about the kidnappers.  So, Thornhill decides to take matters into his own hands and find Kaplan himself.  His quest takes him to various locales across the country, including Chicago, Indiana, and Mount Rushmore.  Thornhill eventually learns that there is no George Kaplan and that he has found himself in the midst of a complex government operation.

Cary Grant's portrayal of Roger Thornhill is great.  He's a selfish, superficial, and he drinks too much, but Grant still manages to make him likable enough that we care what happens to him when he gets kidnapped, and does so in the first few minutes of the film.  His character changes drastically in the course of the film.  For more on that, here's an excerpt from a paper I wrote on this movie for my graduate film studies class.

With the introduction of Eve Kendall (Eva Marie Saint), Thornhill’s character begins to change.  Initially, she seems to be exactly the right woman for Thornhill, in that she is a superficial and noncommittal as he.  The two bond instantaneously and there seems to be a real affection between them. Based on what has been established about Thornhill, it would seem out of character for him to become attached to a woman.  Yet he has, heightening his, and the audience’s, sense of surprise and betrayal at her involvement in the attempt on his life.  The introduction of Eve Kendall functions to help Roger Thornhill mature, and his allowing himself to genuinely feel for her is the first sign of this maturation in the film.  We continue to see him grow as he (and we) learn more about her and their relationship changes.  For example, after he discovers that she was involved in the attempt on his life, he has difficulty trusting her.  When he sees her again in her hotel room, she runs to him, relieved that he is still alive, and his hands encircle her head, in the same way as they did earlier on the train.  Only this time, he stops short of touching her, indicating that the trust formed when they initially met is gone.  Thornhill has learned from his experiences in a way that someone who lives as superficially as the opening of the film suggests he does would be unlikely to do.  The change in Thornhill’s character culminates with his placing himself at risk for the woman he loves and ultimately marrying her.  Again, these are actions that the Thornhill of the beginning of the film is unlikely to take.  The man who once shied away from commitment (it is revealed early in the film that Thornhill has been married, and divorced, twice) is now willing to fully commit himself to another person, even to the point of potentially losing his own life.  Watching these changes in Thornhill evokes a sense of joy in the viewer; we are glad that he has survived his ordeal, that he has at last found true love, and that he has grown enough as a person to recognize and accept love rather than run away from it.

Bernard Hermann's score is fantastic as well.  Here's another excerpt from the paper about how sound functions in the film.

The opening theme is fast-paced, setting an appropriate tone for the big city setting of the film’s opening scene.  Hermann used shifting rhythms in the theme to suggest the chaos which is going to ensue as the film progresses.  The opening theme is repeated several times, providing an aural backdrop for several of the most exciting scenes in the film.  In the kidnapping scene, ominous music which echoes the opening theme alerts the viewer that a threat has been introduced; the mood of the music makes the audience feel threatened and uncomfortable.  During the chase scene, when Thornhill drunkenly takes the wheel of the car, the repetition of the opening theme builds tension and excitement, helping to keep viewers on the edge of their seats.  It plays again in the cafe scene at Mount Rushmore, as Thornhill waits for Eve and VanDamm to arrive.  This time, however, it has been slowed down, making it sound more ominous and creating a sense of dread as the viewer waits to find out what will happen next.


As often happens with movies from this time period, I love the costumes too.  I mean, how cute are these?

We follow up with Strangers on a Train (1951).  Farley Granger (who was also in Rope) plays Guy Haines, a well known tennis player who is soon to be engaged to Anne Morton (Ruth Roman), as soon as he gets his wife, Miriam (Kasey Rogers) to sign the divorce papers.  On a train ride to see Anne and her family, he meets Bruno Antony (Robert Walker), a seemingly friendly tennis fan.  During their conversation, Antony casually reveals his plan for the perfect murder: two strangers each agree to kill someone the other one wants to be rid of.  As an example, he suggests that he can kill Haines' wife, if Haines will kill his father.  Haines dismisses the idea, thinking that surely this man cannot be serious.  But, Antony is quite serious, and thinking that he has found a partner in crime, murders Miriam.  He then begins to harass Haines about fulfilling his end of the bargain.  When it becomes clear that Haines is not going to kill his father, Antony threatens to plant evidence at the scene of Miriam's murder implicating Haines' guilt.  With the police already treating him as a suspect, Haines must race to prevent Antony from planting the evidence and clear his name.  


I had never seen this movie before, and I thought it was fantastic.  Robert Walker plays creepy really well.  He's got the crazy down.  It's in the eyes.  And in how committed he is to his plan.  He really believes that this is a perfectly reasonable thing to do.  It's scary how believable he is.  In a particularly good scene, he is at a party with Guy, Anne, and her family and friends.  He has found another opportunity to talk about his perfect murder scheme, this time with two older women at the party.  To demonstrate how easy it is to kill someone, he places his hands around one of their necks and starts to strangle her, staring intently at Anne's younger sister, Barbara (Patricia Hitchcock).  He forgets himself and almost actually strangles the woman, frightening everyone present, especially Barbara.  Farley Granger puts in a great performance as Guy Haines.  His character is exactly the opposite of Bruno Antony, and it's engaging to watch them interact onscreen.    


Hitchcock's editing is really good in this film too.  In the scene where Haines has chased Antony to the scene of his wife's murder, which happens to be a carnival, the two men end up on an out-of-control carousel as Haines tries to get the piece of evidence away from Antony.  Hitchcock keeps viewers on the edge of their seats by cutting between wide shots of the carousel spinning out of control and close ups of Haines and Antony struggling at the edge of the carousel floor.  Shots of a little boy who is stuck on the carousel and of the carousel horses are thrown in there too.  The shots of the little boy, who, at first, is having the time of his life, are suspenseful because the audience knows that he is in danger, even though he doesn't.  The carousel horses are shot at a low angle and are lit in such a way as to make them look menacing.  

And, again, I love the costumes.

And that's all I have for this one.  I'm off to try and get the image of Robert Walker being creepy out of my head.