North by Northwest

The film has been deemed "culturally significant" by the Library of Congress, and selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry. While Clint Eastwood's earlier roles often featured a "Man with No Name", an anonymous stranger who wanders in to town to set things right, William Munney can be seen as a man who is trying to escape his past identity as the Man With No Name. It is #40 on the American Film Institute's 100 Years, 100 Movies, #4 on its 100 Years, 100 Thrills, and is consistently in the top 25 on the Internet Movie Database's Top 250. However, David Webb Peoples has stated in interviews that this was not his intention, and that he wished to present violence as morally complex, as opposed to simply "wrong". North by Northwest was nominated for three Academy Awards for Film Editing (George Tomasini), Art Direction, and Original Screenplay (Ernest Lehman). Many critics and viewers tend to consider the film emphatically anti-violence. The film is also used as a plot engine in the Family Guy episode "North by North Quahog.". While most Western films glorify violence as a justifiable means to an end, Unforgiven self-conciously tries to depict violence more realistically as something that harms everyone around it.

The Simpsons parodied the scene in two episodes (one with a young Marge, another with Elton John). The film's major theme appears to the nature of violence, and the discrepancies between actual and fictional violence. North By Northwest has been referenced and parodied in many works, mostly for the crop duster scene. For a genre film, Unforgiven is unusally thematically rich. There are similarities between this movie and Hitchcock's earlier film Saboteur (1942), whose final scene on top of the Statue of Liberty foreshadows the Mount Rushmore scene in the later film. In fact, North by Northwest can be seen as the last and best in a long line of "wrong man" films that Hitchcock made according to the pattern he established in The 39 Steps (1935). Little Bill realizes what follows and says "See you in Hell, William Munny", to which Munny replies "Yeah" and kills Little Bill. (The title does makes sense in reference to when Thornhill travels north via Northwest Airlines.). While Munny is reloading his rifle, he hears Little Bill reach for his gun and kicks it out of his hand.

In fact, even the title North by Northwest refers to a compass direction that does not exist (the correct term is "North-northwest"), thereby adding to the fantasticality of the film, as Hitchcock noted in an interview with Peter Bogdanovich in 1963. A gun battle ensues where Munny kills five men and seriously wounds Little Bill. "I can't make heads or tails of it," he said, without realizing that he was quoting the very words he would speak when playing the role of Thornhill. Munny walks into the saloon where Little Bill has assembled a posse. Grant was distressed with the way the plot seemed to wander aimlessly, and he actually approached Hitchcock to complain about the script. This angers Munny and he begins drinking again and goes into town to confront the sheriff. This is reflected by Thornhill's line: "The only performance that will satisfy you is when I play dead.". The next day, one of the prostitutes brings the reward money to Munny and the Kid and tells him of the death of Logan.

Despite its frothy appearance, the movie carries a number of underlying themes, the most important being that of theater and play-acting, wherein everyone is playing a part; no one is who they seem; and identity is in flux. Logan's corpse is put on display in an open coffin outside the saloon. Hitchcock, however, was not above inserting a Freudian joke as the last shot (which, notably, made it past contemporary censors). Meanwhile, Logan is captured and brought back to Little Bill, who beats all the information he can out of him, killing him in the process. In an interview with Francois Truffaut ("Hitchcock / Truffaut"), Hitchcock said that he wanted to do something fun, light-hearted, and generally free of the symbolism permeating his other movies. Munny and the Kid find and kill the other cowboy in a latrine outside the isolated cabinwhere he had been holed up, guarded by several associates. Alfred Hitchcock planned the film as a change of pace after his dark romantic thriller Vertigo a year earlier. It is at that point that Logan realizes he no can no longer stomach murder, and decides to head home.

The film has several plot twists and a sly sense of humor, as well as a number of famous scenes, including one in which Grant's character is chased by a crop duster, and another in which Grant and leading lady Eva Marie Saint clamber over the faces of Mount Rushmore in an attempt to evade their enemies. Once Munny has recovered sufficiently from his injuries, the three men ambush and kill one of the two cowboys in a canyon. Thornhill is framed for murder and forced to elude the police as well as the secret agents. Logan and the Kid manage to get Munny out of town to high country above the town. A Manhattan advertising man, Roger Thornhill (played by Cary Grant), is mistaken for a government agent and pursued by spies who want to kill him. Little Bill beats up Munny and Munny manages to drag himself out out of the saloon. The film also features a famous title sequence by the graphic designer Saul Bass. While waiting for his friends to return, Little Bill Daggett, the local sheriff, discovers Munny is wearing a gun (a town ordinance prohibits guns — Upon their arrival one stormy night, Munny failed to (or chose not to) see the sign stating such).

It is one of several Hitchcock movies with a film score by Bernard Herrmann. After reaching town on a cold, rainy night, they enter a saloon for a drink and inquire about the reward. Munny remains at a table while Logan and the Kid go upstairs for some bedroom fun with the ladies. The screenplay was written by Ernest Lehman, who wanted to write "the Hitchcock picture to end all Hitchcock pictures"[1] (http://alt.tcm.turner.com/essentials/essential/fea_north.html). On their way, they pick up the Schofield Kid (Woolvett), who had told Munny about the reward and had boasted of his own trigger-happiness. Carroll, and Martin Landau. William Munny (Eastwood), a retired gunfighter and now a widowed pig farmer with children whose stock is dying of swine fever and whose prospects are bleak, recruits a former associate Ned Logan (Freeman) to hunt down the two men responsible for the attack on the prostitute. The film stars Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint, James Mason, Leo G. After a prostitute is brutally slashed in the face by two customers, her co-workers offer a $1000 reward to anyone who kills them.

North By Northwest is a 1959 MGM thriller by Alfred Hitchcock and is generally considered one of his best works. It was dedicated to Eastwood's former directors and mentors, Don Siegel and Sergio Leone. It was nominated for Best Actor in a Leading Role (Clint Eastwood), Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Best Cinematography, Best Sound and Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen. It won Academy Awards for Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Gene Hackman), Best Director, Best Film Editing and Best Picture. The movie was written by David Webb Peoples and directed by Eastwood.

It stars Clint Eastwood, Gene Hackman, Morgan Freeman, Richard Harris, Jaimz Woolvett, Saul Rubinek and Frances Fisher. Unforgiven is a 1992 Western film which tells the story of a retired gunslinger who takes on one more job for the money. Burn his damn house down." - Munny. All his friends.

Any sumbitch takes a shot at me, I'm not only gonna kill him, but I'm gonna kill his wife. Any man I see out there, I'm gonna shoot him. "All right now, I'm comin' out. "Then he should have armed himself if he's gonna decorate his saloon with my friend" (Munny).

"You just shot an unarmed man" (Little Bill) .. you take away all he has and all he's ever gonna have." (Munny)..."I guess they had it comin'" (Schofield Kid)..."We all have it comin', kid." (Munny). "Hell of a thing killing a man.. This is an allusion to The Outlaw Josey Wales, in which Eastwood, in response to a similar question, gives a detailed reponse about their various holders and demeanors.

Eastwood responds that he "got lucky". Also, Rubinek asks Eastwood how he chose the order in which to kill six men. The scene in which Eastwood tells Rubinek to pick up the rifle in the bar is an allusion to Once Upon a Time in the West, which has a similar scene in a bar. The opening scene, where Eastwood stands at the grave of his dead wife, is an allusion to John Ford's She Wore a Yellow Ribbon.

The film has several allusions to earlier Westerns. When Eastwood phoned him about the film, Richard Harris was watching High Plains Drifter on TV. However, the snowfall when William Munny was recovering was both unexpected and unscripted. Most of the rain in the film was artificially created, because Calgary was experiencing a dry spell.

Eastwood told Gene Hackman to model his character on the then LA Police Chief Daryl Gates.