North By Northwest by Alfred Hitchcock contains all the elements of a good thriller, from the resourceful hero, the red herrings, to the villain. It's very cliche' and predictable in that manner, but it is categorically sound and fits into its genre snugly.
Cary Grant portrays the hero of the movie (even though for the greater half of the film all he does is proclaim: "I'm not Kaplin!" multiple times) and the villain is portrayed by James Mason, and the stereotypical (if not misogynistic) portrayal of the damsel that needs eventual rescuing by the hero, is played by Eve Marie Saint.
The obvious use of a Maguffin (the secret tapes? Statue? What statue?) is an element which helped fit this movie into the thriller genre perfectly.
Hitchcock said thrillers allow the audience, "to put their toe in the cold water of fear to see what it's like” I personally think that this movie does not embody this at all. I didn't feel any form of 'fear' during watching this movie aside from the fear that it was going to get even more predictable. Maybe I felt something when they were hanging off the cliff in that atrocious visual pun of a 'cliffhanger', but aside from that, nope, I don't think this movie particularly embodies this goal. Perhaps it did when it was first released, but my modernised mind tells me no.
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