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From the brisk strains of Bernard Herrmann’s Antonin Dvorak-inspired opening theme to its concluding gag of a honeymoon train speeding into a tunnel, North by Northwest is the apotheosis of Alfred Hitchcock’s exploration of the wronged man on the run and functioned in 1959 as a summary of the Master of Suspense’s career to date.

Cary Grant, wearing his gray suit like natural skin, embodies smug New York ad executive Roger O. Thornhill, an aging, gin-swilling playboy whose swiftly established m.o. in romance and work is “expedient exaggeration.” Poetic justice strikes as he’s incredibly abducted from the Plaza Hotel bar by the henchmen of an urbane master spy, Phillip Vandamm, who’ve mistaken him for an undercover agent. Framed for a killing at the United Nations, Thornhill runs a cross-country gauntlet of lawmen and baddies, with time for a sleeping-car tryst with an ambiguously remote blonde,...

Alfred Hitchcock: The Iconic Film Collection will collect six of the Master of Suspense’s classics on 4K Ultra HD + Digital: Rear Window, To Catch a Thief, Vertigo, North By Northwest, Psycho, and The Birds.

Releasing on November 26 via Universal, the six-disc set is limited to 5,150. It’s housed in premium book-style packaging featuring artwork by Tristan Eaton along with photos, bios, and trivia.

In 1954’s Rear Window, “A wheelchair-bound photographer spies on his neighbors from his apartment window and becomes convinced one of them has committed murder.”

It’s written by John Michael Hayes (To Catch a Thief), based on Cornell Woolrich’s 1942 short story “It Had to Be Murder.” James Stewart, Grace Kelly, Wendell Corey, Thelma Ritter, and Raymond Burr star.

Rear Window special features:

Audio commentary by Hitchcock’s Rear Window: The Well-Made Film author John Fawell Rear Window Ethics – 2000 documentary Conversation with Screenwriter John Michael...

Warner Bros. is bringing two cinematic classics to a new physical media transfer this Thanksgiving season. Blu-ray.com has announced the 4K Ultra-High Definition Blu-ray releases of Alfred Hitchcock‘s spy thriller North by Northwest and Mel Brooks‘ irreverent western satire Blazing Saddles. Both releases will be hitting retailers on November 19.

North by Northwest stars Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint, James Mason, Jessie Royce Landis, and Leo G. Carroll. The description reads, “Cary Grant stars as an innocent man mistaken for a spy in one of director Alfred Hitchcock’s greatest thrillers. While leaving New York’s Plaza Hotel, advertising executive Roger Thornhill (Grant) has the misfortune of standing just as the name “George Kaplan” is paged–starting a lethal case of mistaken identity and a nonstop game of cat and mouse as he is pursued across North America by espionage agents trying to kill him–and by police who suspect him of murder.

Killer Collectibles highlights five of the most exciting new horror products announced each and every week, from toys and apparel to artwork, records, and much more.

Here are the coolest horror collectibles unveiled this week!

Toony Terrors Figures from Neca

Neca’s latest wave of Toony Terrors, dubbed “Silver Screen,” features black-and-white versions of Nosferatu, Vincent Price, Vampira, and They Live’s Alien in Suit.

Nosferatu comes with a rat. Vincent Price includes a cat, skull, and interchangeable hand. Vampira has a skull. Alien in Suit features a piece of propaganda.

Modeled in the style of classic Saturday morning cartoons, each 6” scale figure comes on blister card packaging with a cutout backdrop. The set of four is available for $64.99.

Killer Klowns from Outer Space Neon Sign from Spirit Halloween

Spirit Halloween has added several neon signs to its arsenal this spooky season, including Killer Klowns from Outer Space‘s cotton candy gun.

There’s a story Alfred Hitchcock always liked to tell about how, when he was five years old, his father dropped him off at the local police station near his home in East London. William Hitchcock left a note for the coppers explaining that his son had been misbehaving. A policeman locked young Alfred in a cell for a few minutes and explained, “This is what we do to naughty boys.”

When Hitchcock recounted that story to Dick Cavett he was in his 70s, but the incident continued to leave a profound mark on the director. He said he was still “terrified of the police” because of that and drew a connection from that to the feelings of guilt and wrong-men-on-the-run paranoia that seeps into so many of his films.

The funny thing is, though, father characters are almost entirely absent from Hitchcock’s work. There are a few: Cedric Hardwicke...

Here's a brief look – to be expanded – at Turner Classic Movies' June 2017 European Vacation Movie Series this evening, June 23. Tonight's destination of choice is Italy. Starring Suzanne Pleshette and Troy Donahue as the opposite of Ugly Americans who find romance and heartbreak in the Italian capital, Delmer Daves' Rome Adventure (1962) was one of the key romantic movies of the 1960s. Angie Dickinson and Rossano Brazzi co-star. In all, Rome Adventure is the sort of movie that should please fans of Daves' Technicolor melodramas like A Summer Place, Parrish, and Susan Slade. Fans of his poetic Westerns – e.g., 3:10 to Yuma, The Hanging Tree – may (or may not) be disappointed with this particular Daves effort. As an aside, Rome Adventure was, for whatever reason, a sizable hit in … Brazil. Who knows, maybe that's why Rome Adventure co-star Brazzi would find himself playing a Brazilian – a macho, traditionalist coffee plantation owner,...

“That wasn’t very sporting, using real bullets.”

Blockbuster action-adventure season has arrived at the movies … but this year it comes with a classic twist from Fathom Events and the TCM Big Screen Classics series:

Alfred Hitchcock‘s often-imitated but never-duplicated thrill ride North By Northwest — the granddaddy of all non-stop action movies — is returning to theaters around the country for two days only on Sunday, April 2, and Wednesday, April 5, at 2 p.m. and 7 p.m. (local time) each day. Tickets are available now at the Fathom Events website. Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint, James Mason and Martin Landau give fast and furious chase across the country, from the skyscrapers of Manhattan to the dizzying peaks of Mount Rushmore, set to the music of Bernard Herrmann, vibrant VistaVision cinematography — and, in this special presentation, new commentary from TCM’s Ben Mankiewicz both before and after the film. The trailer for...

'The Man from U.N.C.L.E.' 2015: Henry Cavill and Armie Hammer. 'The Man from U.N.C.L.E.' movie is a domestic box office bomb: Will it be saved by international filmgoers? Directed by Sherlock Holmes' Guy Ritchie and toplining Man of Steel star Henry Cavill and The Lone Ranger costar Armie Hammer, the Warner Bros. release The Man from U.N.C.L.E. has been a domestic box office disaster, performing about 25 percent below – already quite modest – expectations. (See also: “'The Man from U.N.C.L.E.' Movie: Bigger Box Office Flop Than Expected.”) This past weekend, the $80 million-budget The Man from U.N.C.L.E. collected a meager $13.42 million from 3,638 North American theaters, averaging $3,689 per site. After five days out, the big-screen reboot of the popular 1960s television series starring Robert Vaughn and David McCallum has taken in a mere $16.77 million. For comparison's sake:...

'The Man From U.N.C.L.E.' with Henry Cavill and Armie Hammer. 'The Man from U.N.C.L.E.' box office: Bigger domestic flop than expected? Before I address the box office debacle of Warner Bros.' The Man from U.N.C.L.E., I'd like remark upon the fact that 2015 has been a notable year at the North American box office. That's when the dinosaurs of Jurassic World smashed Hulk and his fellow Halloween-costumed Marvel superheroes of Avengers: Age of Ultron. And smashed them good: $636.73 million vs. $457.52 million. (See also: 'Jurassic World' beating 'The Avengers' worldwide and domestically?) At least in part for sentimental (or just downright morbid) reasons – Paul Walker's death in a car accident in late 2013 – Furious 7 has become by far the highest-grossing The Fast and the Furious movie in the U.S. and Canada: $351.03 million. (Shades of Heath Ledger's unexpected death...

By Lee Pfeiffer

Released in 1962, Boys' Night Out was considered to be a rather racy comedy that touched upon sexual infidelity in the era when June and Ward Cleaver represented the average American household. The story centers on four businessmen- James Garner, Tony Randall, Howard Duff and Howard Morris- who indulge in a weekly night out that consists of nothing more daring than having some drinks and discussing sex. In a moment of deviancy, they decide to chip in and rent a plush Manhattan apartment, with Garner- the only bachelor of the group- acting as the beard and putting the lease in his name. They then intend to hire a hot blonde to service them on different nights of the week. The plan seems to work swimmingly. The apartment is rented and the requisite blonde (Kim Novak) appears ready, willing and able to indulge. What they don't know is...

All About Eve, Roman Holiday, The Ten Commandments, A Place In The Sun, The Sting. These great films and hundreds more have one thing in common: costume designer Edith Head (1897–1981). The small woman with the familiar straight bangs, black-rimmed saucer glasses, and unsmiling countenance racked up an unprecedented 35 Oscar nods and 400 film credits over the course of a sixty-year career. The golden age of Hollywood sparkled with extravagant cinematic productions and stars such as Bette Davis, Elizabeth Taylor, Natalie Wood, Mae West, Cary Grant, Audrey Hepburn, Grace Kelly, Barbara Stanwyck, and Robert Redford were made even more glamorous by donning the costumes designed by the incredibly talented Mrs. Head.

Theater director Susan Claassen, a New Jersey native, got the idea for a project based on Edith Head several years ago after she watched a televised biography of the designer. She realized that her physical resemblance to the designer was uncanny,...

Blu-ray Release Date: March 6, 2012

Price: Blu-ray $15.00

Studio: Paramount Home Entertainment

The Blu-ray debut of Alfred Hitchcock’s 1955 Oscar-winning film To Catch a Thief, starring Cary Grant (An Affair To Remember) and Grace Kelly (Rear Window), boasts 90 minutes of bonus materials, but none of it is new.

But who needs new special features, when we can have this classic in high-definition?

In the romance movie, Grant plays John Robie, a retired cat burglar living the high-life on the Riviera. When a series of copy cat crimes are committed and fingers start pointing his way, he must uncover the real thief to prove his own innocence. Things get complicated when Robie falls for Frances Stevens (Kelly), an heiress whose mother (Jessie Royce Landis, North By Northwest) was a victim of the copy cat thief.

To Catch a Thief won its Academy Award for Robert Burks’ cinematography, but the mystery film also was...

The 1955 Hitchcock thriller is perhaps not as revered as Psycho, Vertigo or Rear Window but it is a stylish, witty affair and the chemistry between Grace Kelly and Cary Grant is an absolute joy. It is a beautifully crafted film, a timepiece of a post-war, pre-60s Europe and it is the next film to place its head on the remake block.

The original works primarily because the thriller aspect, former thief John Robie (a dapper Grant) tries to catch a mysterious burglar who apes his criminal style while fending off the police, his former Resistance pals and the advances of Jessie Royce Landis who is combing the French Riviera to find a suitor for her daughter (Grace Kelly), is secondary to the emerging and playfully duplicitous love affair between its two leads.

Why am I waxing lyrical about this treasured film now? The title of the post gives it...

The Movie:

“You know, we’re not making a movie. We’re constructing an organ…the kind of organ that you see in the theatre. And we press this chord and now the audience laughs, we press that chord and they gasp, and we press these notes and they chuckle.” – Alfred Hitchcock to North By Northwest screenwriter Ernest Lehman.

You know the scenes. You know the music. You know every one-liner and suave expression from Cary Grant’s debonair face. There isn’t much that hasn’t already been said about North By Northwest. Easily Alfred Hitchcock’s most noted “mistaken identity” thriller and, arguably, his greatest achievement in movie making, it lives up to the hype and holds its own against any film of the like that comes out today. Fifty years after its release, it remains the crowning achievement of the Hitchcock thrillers, and it does so much...

Every week, Film School Rejects presents a movie that was made before you were born and tells you why you should like it. This week, Old Ass Movies presents: To Catch a Thief (1955) If there was one thing I had to work at avoiding with covering movies from before 1960, it was featuring a Hitchcock film every single week. What some might call an unhealthy obsession with the man's work, I call a totally normal need to watch one of his films every hour on the hour and make cross-country trips to check out the filming sites. However, my passion for all things Hitch aside, To Catch a Thief is probably one of his most popular films, and if not his best, it's definitely the most accessible. In the picture, Cary Grant plays John Robie - a famous cat burglar inventively nicknamed The Cat - who has to run from police when thefts baring his signature style start...

DVD Review To Catch A Thief - 2-Disc Centennial Collection Directed by: Alfred Hitchcock Cast: Cary Grant, Grace Kelly, Jessie Royce Landis, John Williams Running Time: 1 hr 46 mins Rating: Not Rated Due out: 3/24/09 Plot: A reformed jewel thief (Grant) must find out who is behind robberies similar to his old style before he is pinned with the crimes themselves. Who's It For? Lovers of Hitchcock and Cary Grant fans - but if you're either of those, you've probably already seen this. Movie: There's nothing like a good Hitchcock film, especially with an iconic coupling like Cary Grant and Grace Kelly. The action here is exciting. It's fun, intelligent fare from a director more than capable of giving us a wonderful, twisting tour of the French Riviera. This...

Chicago – A Disney movie and two all-time classics being inducted in Paramount’s “Centennial Collection” make up this week’s version of the “DVD Round-Up,” your safety net for titles that may have slipped by your home entertainment radar.

The Round-Up, HollywoodChicago.com’s famous recurring column about lesser Blu-Ray and DVD titles that may have slipped through your fingers at the store recently, brings you three catalog titles being reissued for DVD in new two-disc editions.

“Lilo & Stitch: 2-Disc Big Wave Edition,” “The Centennial Collection: The Odd Couple,” and “The Centennial Collection: To Catch a Thief” will all be released on March 24th, 2009.

“Lilo & Stitch: 2-Disc Big Wave Edition”

Photo credit: Disney Piggy-backing on the more awesome and high-profile Blu-Ray release for “Bolt,” Disney is giving fans a chance to catch up on one of their bigger titles from the early part of the decade, 2002’s “Lilo & Stitch,” now...