North by Northwest (1959)
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An innocent man is pursued across the United States by a mysterious organization after being mistaken for a non-existent agent.
The story
Advertising executive Roger Thornhill is mistaken for a man named George Kaplan and is kidnapped by a group of men. After surviving an attempted murder, Thornhill finds himself in a desperate situation, pursued by a mysterious organization that believes he is a spy. He must navigate a series of dangerous encounters across the United States, from a luxury train to a rural Indiana cornfield, while trying to clear his name and uncover the truth about the organization's motives and his own role in their plot.
Full plot (contains spoilers)
Roger Thornhill is kidnapped and mistaken for a spy named George Kaplan. After surviving an assassination attempt, he flees and is pursued by a mysterious organization. He meets Eve Kendall on a train to Chicago, where he discovers that Kaplan is a fictitious identity created as a decoy. The plot involves a 'MacGuffin'—microfilm containing government secrets. Thornhill eventually tracks the real villains to a location near Mount Rushmore. He discovers that Kendall is actually a double agent. In the climax, Thornhill and Kendall flee together to the top of Mount Rushmore, where the primary antagonist is apprehended by authorities. The film ends with the two of them fleeing together on a train.
- First release year
- 1959
- Runtime (minutes)
- 136
- Production countries
- United States
- Original languages
- English
- Directors
- Alfred Hitchcock
- Writers
- Ernest Lehman · writer
- Cast and characters
- Cary Grant · Roger Thornhill; Eva Marie Saint · Eve Kendall; James Mason · Phillip Vandamm; Jessie Royce Landis
- Genres
- spy thriller; mystery; comedy; action
- Themes
- deception; mistaken identity; moral relativism
- Tone and mood
- fun; light-hearted
- Premise and plot tags
- Cold War; espionage; road movie
- Source material / true-story basis
- Original screenplay by Ernest Lehman
- Reception
- The film was a critical and commercial success, praised for its style and being considered one of the greatest films ever made.
- Reported review scores
- Rotten Tomatoes · score: 97% · scale: percentage · review count: 119; Metacritic · score: 98 · scale: 100 · review count: 16
- Awards and nominations
- Edgar Award · Best Motion Picture Screenplay · 1960 · win; Silver Shell · Best Director · win
- Production trivia
- The film was the first to feature extended use of kinetic typography in its opening credits.; The crop-duster scene was filmed near Wasco, California, with added signs to look like Indiana.
Film metadata comes from the open sources listed in Credits & Contact. Catalogue details may be incomplete.
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