Release Year: 1959

Genre: Biography, Drama, History

Director: Alfred Hitchcock

Writer: Ernest Lehman

Stars: Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint

Picture a Mad Man: a suave, witty advertising exec with a couple divorces under his belt—impeccably dressed, irresistible to the ladies and a little too fond of the drink. He's good at manipulating the public, but he's not really who everyone thinks he is.

Thinking of something like this guy?

Move over Don Draper—Roger Thornhill is in the building.

In fact, Alfred Hitchcock's comic spy thriller North by Northwest is Mad Men on steroids: Madder Men, you might say.

Why's that? Well, for one thing, the film was made in 1959, just before Season One of the AMC series begins. Plus, NXNW stars the great Cary Grant who's an even hotter and wittier Jon Hamm.

That's right. We went there.

Of course, we're not the first to make the comparison. Even Matthew Weiner, creator of Mad Men, acknowledges the influence of NXNW on the show (source).

So our Mad Man is Roger Thornhill, and Hitch's film gets off to a glam start in his world of multi-martini business meetings, ritzy hotel bars, and killer tailored suits. But Thornhill doesn't get to stay home for long. A case of mistaken identity has people chasing him all over the map, and the film follows him as he travels by train, plane, and, unforgettably, old-fashioned foot to escape them.

Thornhill's been taken for an undercover agent named George Kaplan. Cold War spies think they've found him out, and when he won't fess up—that is, when Thornhill won't admit he's Kaplan—they try to kill him. When that doesn't work, they frame him for the murder of a high-powered delegate at the United Nations.

Thornhill flees aboard the 20th Century Limited in search of answers. He wants to know who set him up and assumes that the real George Kaplan will clue him in. In the process, he crosses paths with the lovely and mysterious Eve Kendall, this film's Hitchcock blonde and unmistakable femme fatale who's more involved than Thornhill realizes.

This film about international intrigue broke records in Hollywood for high-paced action, offering up one high-speed and high-altitude chase after another. Just when you think there's no room left on the edge of your seat—after the crop-duster sequence, say, which made movie history—the next chase proves you wrong.

Generally considered Hitch's best caper film, NXNW scored a perfect 100% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, scooped up 3 Oscar noms (what, no wins?), and is ranked 55th on AFI's Greatest American Films of all time. Film legend Cary Grant is at his suave, comic best, and Hitch crashed the U.N. and Mount Rushmore to give us a rollicking tour of the land of the free and the home of the brave.

Witty dialogue, steamy seduction scenes, dizzying action, ahead-of-its-time camera work. It's all proof, according to the UK's Daily Mail critic Cristopher Toomey, that "great action movies don't have to be meaningless and moronic" (source).

Don't let all the "witty" and "sophisticated" turn you off, though: this movie's full of action from start to finish. So check out the original Mad Man and decide for yourself—Team Draper or Team Thornhill?

Hitchcock is known as the Master of Suspense and he's so true to his nickname here that you basically get schooled in the technique of suspense just by watching.

But that's just Hitchcock. What about North By Northwest? We couldn't decide, so we narrowed it down to two reasons to care:

(1) NXNW was hugely influential for later filmmakers. And we don't just mean the fancy French film-school types who worshipped Hitch as the ultimate cinematic stylist, the alpha and omega of auteurs. We're talking about down-and-dirty, all-American directors, the guys who brought you action flick franchises like Die Hard and Lethal Weapon. You can see NXNW's traces in almost every action movie since 1959. And you can impress your friends with pointing out how NXNW practically created the James Bond franchise.

(2) The movie is a beautiful distillation of the Mad Men period aesthetic. It shows New York and every other city and site it visits at their glamorous best. But that's just the beginning, literally, since every last visual detail, from clothes to architecture, is on point. It's the ultimate retro-cool experience.

Still not convinced? You're one tough customer. Maybe this will help to convince you: a fellow film buff's list of lots more reasons why North by Northwest still rules.