MovieChat Forums > North by Northwest (1959) Discussion > Sexual symbolism of the final shot...

Sexual symbolism of the final shot...

posted 9 years ago by barcham_99
28 replies | jump to latest

I watched this last night for the nth time. I have seen this movie so many times I have lost count but can never resist when it is running. But for the first time, maybe because I was very tired and it was around 3 am when it ended, but the final shot seemed to be filled with sexual innuendo. Thornhill and the new Mrs. Thornhill roll into bed as man and wife and then the scene shifts to a train entering a tunnel. For whatever reason, that just seemed to me to be so loaded with sexual meaning last night.

Now what I want to know is whether anyone else sees that scene the same way or if I simply have a perverted mind! LOL I've never noticed anyone bring this up in discussions of the film so it is probably the latter. 

[–] MarCllad 8 years ago

It's entirely intentional as far as I know. I always found it to be hilarious.

[–] MisterPatrick 8 years ago

I understood the symbolism the first time I saw it. Pretty obvious.

"The thought of me dead gives you an erection!" "No! Just half of one."

[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

I rather like the context of the joke as a matter of visuals and Herrmann's great musical score:

On the shot of Roger and "Mrs. Thornhill" in the sleeping car, Herrmann brings back the rather too sweet and old-fashioned "love theme" of North by Northwest, and then on the cut to the train entering the tunnel, that theme gains force and power and orchestration and suddenly becomes the thunderous "orchestral coda and flourish" that tells the audience: "and here we are, at the happy romantic ending of this once-in-a-lifetime great adventure."

I've been to screenings where the audience applauds and cheers as The End comes on the screen and the train enters the tunnel.

But they laugh too. Knowingly and gratefully towards Hitchcock's direct sexual double entendre.

PS. This train into tunnel shot is a pretty famous Hitchcockian sex symbolism shot, but there's another big one earlier in the Hitchcock canon, and also with Cary Grant: In "To Catch a Thief," Grant's suave and knowing capitulation to Grace Kelly's voracious sexual approach yields to a sexy kiss and a cut to fireworks exploding in a rather "orgasmic" display.

[–] TheUltimateHippo (2250) 6 years ago

Ha, I was thinking the same thing.

[–] greenbudgie (2355) 3 years ago

I think 'The Lady Eve' had already done this much more brazenly 18 years previously. There are several shots of trains going through tunnels intercut with Barbara Stanwyck telling Henry Fonda how many men she had known in the past.