hitchcock thriller a classic> ‘North by Northwest’ based on story, actors

“North by Northwest,” directed by Alfred Hitchcock, 136 minutes, unrated, 7 p.m. June 30-July 3, Railroad Square Cinema, Waterville.

Recently, after comparing one of the finest films ever made to some of this summer’s biggest blockbusters, I was left wondering about the current state of American culture and where we have gone wrong in American cinema.

To go from an intelligent, witty, savvy and genuinely thrilling movie like Hitchcock’s “North by Northwest” to the steroid-propelled, testosterone-injected explosions of “Con Air,” “Batman and Robin,” and “Speed 2: Cruise Control,” forced me to consider cloning as a viable fix; we need somehow to bring back Hitchcock and stars like Cary Grant if only to show young audiences how they are being cheated by today’s Hollywood.

There are good thrillers out there — Kurt Russell’s “Breakdown” is one film I can recommend — but lately, it seems as though I’ve been suspending disbelief for so long I’ve developed vertigo.

Thankfully, we have films like “North by Northwest” (among so many others, which I will touch on in coming weeks) to turn to when we want to be reminded of what thrillers could be if only Hollywood concentrated more on story and character development, rather than on the next natural disaster to be created — surprise! — by computer simulation.

For those who haven’t seen this film, “North by Northwest,” currently in re-release, is about a case of mistaken identity. Roger Thornhill (Cary Grant) is mistaken for the mysterious George Kaplin by a group of spies that deals in the exportation of U.S. government secrets. Thornhill is abducted by these spies, brought to the estate of Philip Vandamm (James Mason) — who heads the operation — and is interrogated by him.

Thornhill, who denies he’s Kaplin, soon is forced to become him in a bizarre effort to save his life. Along the way, the twists and turns are harrowing — he’s framed for a murder, sought by the police, meets the cool and gorgeous Eve Kendall (Eva Marie Saint), falls in love with her, gets double-crossed by her, takes two bullets in the chest by her, escapes from a crop-dusting plane (a sequence better than anything in “Con Air”), finds himself hanging from the stony lips of dead presidents on Mount Rushmore and, ultimately, wins the girl.

And what a girl! Saint is so sizzling with Grant, the heat they create would melt a lesser star’s implants. Hitchcock knew he couldn’t pair Grant with a strong, dominating female lead like Joan Crawford or Bette Davis; it never would have worked and, in his career, Grant was never paired with either of them.

Instead, Grant needs an intelligent woman who can not only match his wit, word for word, but also can be seduced by his substantial charm. He needs a woman willing to go after him, and Saint does so with a cool aggression almost shocking for its time.

But it is Hitchcock who gives us the best gift. He allows us to revel in what his two stars are: the classy and sophisticated embodiment of who we’d like to be. Today’s thriller audiences aren’t quite so lucky. I don’t necessarily see people aspiring to Stallone’s questionable style of elocution, nor dreaming of sporting Clooney’s and Silverstone’s nippled Batsuits — unless, of course, it’s in the privacy of their own bedrooms.

Propelled not by explosions, but by its crackling dialogue, its gripping performances and its horizontal, linear narrative, “North by Northwest” over the years became a blueprint for filmmakers and novelists in its technical brilliance. It’s a shame that blueprint is greatly overlooked by today’s directors, who seem determined to turn heroes into nail-chomping, bullet-biting, harpoon-hurling cartoons, but encouraging that it is still alive in the novels of John Le Carre, Robert Harris, and P.D. James. I supose there’s hope that some studio — Mirimax, perhaps — will turn the best of these writers’ works into great cinematic thrillers. But in the meantime, see this film when it’s re-released, or rent it now on video.

Grade: A

Video of the Week

“Welcome to the Dollhouse,” written and directed by Todd Solondz, 87 minutes, rated R (language and sexual content).

Were you the ostracized one in junior high school? The one with the wrong face, the wrong hair, the wrong teeth, the wrong clothes, or the wrong family? Or were you the evil accepted one who terrorized others by pointing out their flaws — real or imagined? In “Welcome to the Dollhouse,” writer and director Todd Solondz remembers that time, as well as Stephen King did in his novel, “It,” and you come away from the film feeling either ashamed of your conduct as an 11-year-old, or reeling from the memories of what others did to you. Heather Matarazzo delivers a flawless performance as the unpopular and beleaguered Dawn Wiener, a young, geeky-looking girl who simply cannot win: not with her peers (who call her Wiener Dog and Lesbo) or with her own family. Sobering and intense, the film also is very funny and forces us to see the pain beneath the humor. If it weren’t for the language, I’d suggest parents show it to their own teen-agers — and then talk to them about it. But, maybe they should, anyway.

Grade: A-

Christopher Smith, a writer and critic who lives in Brewer, reviews movies each Monday in the NEWS.