An almost perfect thriller

Rating: 9/10 (28 November 2000)

Non-stop suspense, action and humour. I gave this a 9 out of 10. Cary is at his best here and should have had an Oscar (hard to believe that that particular year it went to one note Charlton Heston!). I would have loved to have seen Grace Kelly portray the Kendall role, she would have delivered the ice Eve Marie Saint tried and did not quite succeed in pulling off. All the support bits are great - I recognise so many stock players from this movie. I have never seen it on the big screen and would love to, the Mount Rushmore sequence, the U.N., the train, the coast, and of course the crop-dusting scenes would look so much better on full screen. James Mason is great and also Martin Landau in his first role. Quite daring for 1959 in its implied sexuality - though I understand that one of Eve's lines on the train was dubbed over as being too risque - she apparently says "I never make love on an empty stomach" and that is dubbed to "I don't discuss making love...." one for the trivia books. Up there with "Rear Window" as my favourite Hitchcocks.