James Stewart and Gregory Peck were also rans for the character of Roger Thornhill while Cyd Charisse, Sophia Loren and Elizabeth Taylor were contenders for the role of Eve Kendall. I would've still been a great movie with any of these actors but I'm quite happy with the heroine and heroine casting we got.
The original trailer-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRfmTpmIUwo
and a pretty good fan trailer-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hS7eiBIbot0
Thanks for the update; just set the DVR. I watched Vertigo in HD a few weeks ago, my favorite Hitchcock film. Truly creepy. NXNW is much more silly fun, and helped invent the spy film McGuffin. In this case, the sought after “microfilm”.
Thanks for the reminder!
Good tip, RF.
If anyone would like some nice reading to go along with the theme of the movie, here’s a nice PDF, 8.8 MB, from an old Senate hearing that will bring back some memories (from real life) about the CIA of that era.
http://www.intelligence.senate.gov/pdfs/95mkultra.pdf
Makes the troubles of poor Roger O. Thornhill pale in comparison.
I am particularly fond of this film, because it is the one and only film I actually sat and watched with my grandmother, and she knew I would like it.
They need to remake this movie.
They could revamp the whole biplane buzzing Stewart scene and have a drone circling far above lauching Hellfire missles at Matt Damon.
If I weren’t on my damned phone reading FR... I would have a promo poster doctored up to go with my post.
Interesting use of opening titles. Very innovative, and repeated by Fincher in Panic Room.
I spent most of my life living close enough to the railroad in the movie to hear the trains at night. The farm my father grew up on sold part of its land to make the railroad. “North by Northwest” is the only movie I’ve watched in the last ten years, after I bought the 50th aniversary DVD.