Cary Grant, North by Northwest.
i wonder if Alfred Hitchcock ever made a truely bad movie.
Sure, there are lesser Hitchcock films (like Marnie, Lifeboat), but really: nothing compares to North by Northwest. Eva Marie Saint, Martin Landau, Mount Rushmore, Bernard Herrmann’s score, all classic. This image in particular is so iconic, so branded into my consciousness - that even if his other movies were terrible, Hitchcock gets a lifetime pass from me.