History Film / StrangersOnATrain

* BookEnds: In the final scene, a stranger -- a clergyman -- recognizes Guy on a train and tries to strike up a conversation with him. He and Ann respond by getting up and moving to another car.

The movie was based on a novel by Patricia Highsmith (of ''{{Ripliad}}'' fame) and had a screenplay originally written by RaymondChandler (before he was fired and replaced). The book and the movie are the TropeNamer, TropeMaker, and TropeCodifier for StrangersOnATrainPlotMurder, although there's a lot more to the story than [[AllThereIsToKnowAboutTheCryingGame just that one trope]].

It's set to be [[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0455788/ remade in 2011]], though details are scarce.

* ReflectiveEyes: Or Reflective Eyeglasses, anyway; we see [[spoier:Bruno strangle Miriam]] in them after they're knocked to the ground.

** And that's Hitch's daughter Patricia, well before Psycho.

The movie was based on a novel by Patricia Highsmith and had a screenplay originally written by RaymondChandler (before he was fired and replaced). The book and the movie are the TropeNamer, TropeMaker, and TropeCodifier for StrangersOnATrainPlotMurder, although there's a lot more to the story than [[AllThereIsToKnowAboutTheCryingGame just that one trope]].

* DisproportionateRetribution: The cops at the end shoot at Guy (when he's running into a crowd of children, no less) instead of just chasing after him. Nobody seems to care that one of the shots hits and kills the merry-go-round attendant.

* MommyIssues: Bruno

* PsychologicalHorror: Not as much compared to some Hitchcock movies, but it's certainly there. There are moments when Bruno is ''terrifying''.

* HarsherInHindsight: Robert Walker, who played Bruno, suffered from mental and emotional problems in RealLife. Less than two months after this film's premiere, he had an emotional outburst following a bout of drinking. His housekeeper summoned Walker's psychiatrist, who administered an injection of sodium amytal to try and calm him down; the drug interacted with the alcohol in his system to cause a severe (and ultimately fatal) reaction.

* {{Foil}}: Bruno and Guy, very intentonal (see NumerologicalMotif below)

* AmbiguouslyGay: Bruno

[[caption-width-right:350:some caption text]]

* AdaptationDisplacement: The novel is pretty well forgotten, whereas the movie is a classic.

* HighOctaneNightmareFuel: "His hands were on ''her'' neck, but he was strangling ''me''."

A 1951 AlfredHitchcock thriller starring Farley Granger and Robert Walker. Guy Haines (Granger), an amateur tennis star, meets the eccentric Bruno Antony (Walker)on a train. Bruno has read about Guy's romantic troubles in the paper, and suggests that he might want to...[[MurderIsTheBestSolution dispose of his wife]], the unfaithful Mrs. Miriam Joyce Haines (Kasey Rogers under the alias "Laura Elliot"), so he can marry Anne Morton (Ruth Roman), the daughter of a senator. Bruno tells Guy of his own unhappiness with his father, and outlines his plot for the perfect murder: [[StrangersOnATrainPlotMurder two strangers who both have someone they want dead "exchange murders"]]. Guy laughs the whole thing off and gets off the train but, as he learns a few days later, Bruno wasn't joking.

* AngryGuardDog: Subverted. After sneaking into the Anthony house late at night to find Bruno's father and [[spoiler:warn him]], Guy encounters a growling Great Dane on the stairs. However, as he gets closer the dog comes up and licks his hand.

* BookEnds: At the end, a stranger tries to strike up a conversation with Guy on a train. He responds by getting up and moving to another car.

A 1951 AlfredHitchcock thriller starring Farley Granger and Robert Walker. Guy Haines (Granger), an amateur tennis star, meets the eccentric Bruno Antony (Walker)on a train. Bruno has read about Guy's romantic troubles in the paper, and suggests that he might want to...[[MurderIsTheBestSolution dispose of his wife]], the unfaithful Mrs. Miriam Joyce Haines (KaseyRogers under the alias "Laura Elliot"), so he can marry Anne Morton (RuthRoman), the daughter of a senator. Bruno tells Guy of his own unhappiness with his father, and outlines his plot for the perfect murder: [[StrangersOnATrainPlotMurder two strangers who both have someone they want dead "exchange murders"]]. Guy laughs the whole thing off and gets off the train but, as he learns a few days later, Bruno wasn't joking.

A 1951 AlfredHitchcock thriller starring Farley Granger and Robert Walker. Guy Haines (Granger), an amateur tennis star, meets the eccentric Bruno Antony (Walker)on a train. Bruno has read about Guy's romantic troubles in the paper, and suggests that he might want to...[[MurderIsTheBestSolution dispose of his wife]], the unfaithful Mrs. Miriam Joyce Haines (KaseyRogers under the alias "Laura Elliot"), so he can marry Anne Morton (RuthRoman), the daughter of a senator. Bruno outlines his plot for the perfect murder: [[StrangersOnATrainPlotMurder two strangers who both have someone they want dead "exchange murders"]]. Guy laughs the whole thing off and gets off the train but, as he learns a few days later, Bruno wasn't joking.