I found North by Northwest very enjoyable for its action scenes, romance, and humor. What stood out most to me was the humor used in the film. I thought it to be more subtle, yet at the same time bold. For example, when Eve tells Thornhill, the leading man, that she’s a big girl, he responds that she’s “big in all the right places.” A compliment with the same meaning would not be as delicately given today and likely seen as rather rude. Additionally, this humor went on continuously for lengthy scenes, while I feel like I’m used to comical one liners in modern movies. Humor was incorporated in scenes that weren’t meant to be comedic. For example, the scene where Thornhill is in the open field waiting more the bus is meant to be suspenseful, but humor is incorporated by the scenery chosen and the random character who gets out of the mysterious car, all without breaking the suspense. Even with all the humor, I wouldn’t at all classify the movie as a comedy and this demonstrates how subtly the humor is incorporated.

The strong prevalence of high-quality humor had me laughing throughout the movie. I’ll definitely be adding other Hitchcock movies to my watch list.