History Film / StrangersOnATrain

Guy Haines (Granger), an amateur tennis star, chances to meet the eccentric Bruno Anthony (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 (Creator/RuthRoman), the daughter of a U.S. Senator (Creator/LeoGCarroll). Bruno tells Guy of his own unhappiness with his father, and outlines his plot for the perfect murder: [[StrangersOnATrainPlotMurder two strangers who each have someone they want dead "exchange murders"]] so that neither's motive can be uncovered. Guy laughs the whole thing off and gets off the train but, as he learns a few days later, Bruno wasn't joking.

The book and film together are the {{Trope Namer|s}}, {{Trope Maker|s}}, and TropeCodifier for StrangersOnATrainPlotMurder, though that particular trope is actually just one part of a complex storyline here. Creator/RaymondChandler wrote the first draft of the screenplay (before he was fired and replaced).

This was the final completed film for Creator/RobertWalker, who died suddenly of drug and alcohol abuse less than two months after release.[[note]]He did appear in one more film (''My Son John''), but his death occurred before he finished filming his scenes.[[/note]]

* ForcedPerspective: The final scene of the so-called American version has Barbara and Anne Morton waiting for Guy to call on the telephone. Alfred Hitchcock wanted the phone in the foreground to dominate the shot, emphasizing the importance of the call, but the limited depth-of-field of contemporary motion picture lenses made it difficult to get both phone and women in focus. So Hitchcock had an oversized phone constructed and placed in the foreground. Anne reaches for the big phone, but actually answers a regular one.

* EvilIsPetty: Shortly before murdering Miriam, Bruno pops a child's balloon for fun. His motives for killing his father also boil down to his father telling him to get a job and stop mooching off the family wealth.

* MommasBoy: Goes hand in hand with Bruno's OedipusComplex.

* OedipusComplex: Bruno wants to kill his father and is very... ''close'' with his mother. More so in the book where Bruno's mother is described as moderately attractive and has a lot of male friends. In the film, she's fairly old and delusional.

* TestYourStrengthGame: An EstablishingCharacterMoment for Buno, showcasing his physical prowess. He follows Miriam and her two beaus to an amusement park where he impresses her with his strength by winning the "Test Your Strength Game". The vendor half-jokingly says that Bruno broke the bell.

* PsychopathicManchild: Bruno. He's a spoiled rich brat who wants to murder his father for telling him to get a job, essentially.

* EvilIsPetty: Shortly before murdering Miriam, Bruno pops a child's balloon for fun.

* PsychopathicManchild: Bruno.

* SissyVillain: Bruno.

* NoOSHACompliance: Why does the merry-go-round have an option to go ''dangerously'' fast? Why isn't there a safety lever that makes it slow down gradually instead of brakes that would only [[FromBadToWorse end up making matters worse]] once physics ensue when a fast moving object stops?

* ThePerfectCrime: At least as Bruno likes to see it.

* RichIdiotWithNoDayJob: Bruno hates his rich father partly because the latter wanted him to take on a regular job.

* HereWeGoAgain: Defied. At the very end of the movie, Guy and Anne are sitting on a train and a man sitting across from them recognizes him and asks, "Aren't you Guy Haines?" Obviously not wanting to repeat what happened with Bruno, Guy and Anne get up and walk away.

* HandStomp: Hugo stomps on Guy's hands when the latter is hanging on to a steel bar to keep him from being propelled away from the spinning carousel.

A 1951 PsychologicalThriller film directed by Creator/AlfredHitchcock, starring Creator/FarleyGranger and Creator/RobertWalker.

The film, [[TheFilmOfTheBook based on]] [[Literature/StrangersOnATrain a novel of the same name]] by Patricia Highsmith (of ''Literature/{{Ripliad}}'' fame), had a screenplay originally written by Creator/RaymondChandler (before he was fired and replaced). The book and film together are the {{Trope Namer|s}}, {{Trope Maker|s}}, and TropeCodifier for StrangersOnATrainPlotMurder, although there's a lot more to the plot than just that one trope.

* ForcedPerspective: The final scene of the so-called American version has Barbara and Anne Morton waiting for Guy to call on the telephone. Alfred Hitchcock wanted the phone in the foreground to dominate the shot, emphasizing the importance of the call, but the limited depth-of-field of contemporary motion picture lenses made it difficult to get both phone and women in focus. So Hitchcock had an oversized phone constructed and placed in the foreground. Anne reaches for the big phone but actually answers a regular one.

* IdiotBall: A fair amount of the drama could have been easily avoided if Guy had just gone to the police after finding out Bruno killed his ex-wife. If Bruno accused him of conspiracy, Guy could mount an easy defense since there was no exchange of money, no evidence of coercion, the two men had never met before and Bruno's father could've easily testified to his son's general instability, which he probably would have done because he believed Bruno needed help. In addition he was more-or-less the son-in-law of a Senator, which would have probably given him access to a more than competent defense attorney. What's more, the police could've easily verified Guy's alibi for the night of the murder. Even if Guy's witness didn't remember him, the platform/train attendants who presumably took his bags at New York and then Washington could have identified him and debunked the theory that he got on at Baltimore.

* InformedAttribute: Bruno claims his father is a horrible person, but we have only the word of a madman to go on. Indeed, the one time we see him he appears genuinely concerned for his son's well-being. More so in the novel, where the aforementioned scene never takes place and the reader knows nothing about Bruno's father right up until [[spoiler:Guy kills him]], at which point a private detective in Bruno's father's employ tells Bruno that if he honestly thinks his father didn't love him then he really didn't know him at all.

* NoOSHACompliance: Why does the marry-go-round have an option to go ''dangerously'' fast? Why isn't there a safety lever that makes it slow down gradually instead of brakes that would only [[FromBadToWorse end up making matters worse]] once physics ensue when a fast moving object stops?

* WouldHurtAChild: [[spoiler:In the climax, after the carousel has accelerated to dangerous speeds, Bruno throws a little boy off his horse. He gets ''very'' close to the edge before Guy saves him at the last minute and gets him out of harm's way]].

* TestYourStrengthGame: Bruno follows Miriam and her two beaus to an amusement park where he impresses her with his strength by winning the "Test Your Strength Game". The vendor half-jokingly says that Bruno broke the bell.

* GettingCrapPastTheRadar: Due to overwhelming and persistent misuse, GCPTR is on-page examples only until 01 June 2021. If you are reading this in the future, please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition.

%% * GettingCrapPastThe Radar: Due to overwhelming and persistent misuse, GCPTR is on-page examples only until 01 June 2021. If you are reading this in the future, please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition.

* HomoeroticSubtext: Creator/AlfredHitchcock and Robert Walker (Bruno) worked out an elaborate series of gestures and physical appearance to suggest the homosexuality and seductiveness of Bruno's character while bypassing censor objections.

* InspirationNod: ''Film/ThrowMommaFromTheTrain'' is built around the same let's-trade-murders plot. This is directly referenced in the movie when writing teacher Larry tells his hapless student Owen to watch some Hitchcock for inspiration. Owen watches the first few minutes of ''Strangers'', immediately recognizes the similarity to his current situation, and runs off to kill Larry's wife.

* AdaptationalUgliness: Bruno's mother is a mild case. In the book, she keeps up a youthful appearance; Bruno is specifically proud of her for having the ''legs'' of a much younger woman. In the movie, she looks realistically like a woman in her sixties and [[AdaptationalModesty we never get a look at her legs]].

* AssholeVictim: Miriam Haines is an extremely selfish adulteress who cheats on Guy and uses the resulting pregnancy to keep Guy from leaving her. [[spoiler:All of this softens the blow when she gets killed by Bruno.]]

* ConspicuousInTheCrowd: As Guy Haines prepares for a tennis match, he notices a single man in the stands is staring at him, instead of watching the ball in the current match like everyone else is. He's unnerved when he recognizes him as the stranger who suggested Guy murder his father in exchange for murdering Guy's promiscuous wife.

* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: Much like in ''Film/ShadowOfADoubt'', there is a pre-occupation with strangulation in this film, Bruno strangles Miriam and Guy expresses a desire to strangle Miriam. Their desire may very well be a response to subconscious sexual urges, namely that of erotic asphyxiation. It's also important to note that Miriam, declared a tramp and adulteress by numerous characters before and after her murder, is double teamed by two men in the tunnel of love and goes to the secluded island, which is referred to as a hot spot for 'smoochers', with them. For comparison, in the book at least one of her companions is noted to be her brother.

* ReallyGetsAround: Miriam, full stop. She cheats on Guy, gets pregnant with another man's baby, and even after refusing to divorce Guy, still goes on a carnival date with two other men.

* SinisterSuffocation: Discussed. The antagonist playfully asks two women what they would consider to be the best way to murder a person. He then dismisses all of their guesses and replies that strangulation is the only correct answer, as it leaves no bloodstains, produces no noises, and causes death in a relatively quick timeframe

* SpannerInTheWorks: Bruno's plan to plant Guy's cigarettes lighter gets delayed due to a random passersby who bumps into and causes him to drop the lighter into the street grate.

* StrangersOnATrainPlotMurder: [[invoked]] {{Trope Namer|s}}, and an UnbuiltTrope: Guy laughs Bruno's suggestion off as a joke, only to discover that Bruno is all too serious. [[spoiler:In the end, Guy doesn't go through with it -- in the movie, at least.]]

* WeAreNotGoingThroughThatAgain: At the end of the American version, Guy finds himself in a train carriage with a stranger who recognises him and tries to strike up a conversation. Having just gone through a hell of an ordeal resulting from someone else on a train recognising him and striking up a conversation, Guy gets up and goes to another compartment without saying a word.

* DefiantToTheEnd: In the face of a witness to his murder, his possession of incriminating evidence, and his [[spoiler: imminent death]], Bruno ''never'' stops trying to [[spoiler: frame Guy.]]

* InformedAttribute: Bruno claims his father is a horrible person, but we have only the word of a madman to go on. Indeed, the one time we see him he appears genuinely concerned for his son's well-being. More so in the novel, where the aforementioned scene never takes place and the reader knows nothing about Bruno's father right up until [[spoiler: Guy kills him]], at which point a private detective in Bruno's father's employ tells Bruno that if he honestly thinks his father didn't love him then he really didn't know him at all.

The film, [[TheFilmOfTheBook based on]] a novel of the same name by Patricia Highsmith (of ''Literature/{{Ripliad}}'' fame), had a screenplay originally written by Creator/RaymondChandler (before he was fired and replaced). The book and film together are the {{Trope Namer|s}}, {{Trope Maker|s}}, and TropeCodifier for StrangersOnATrainPlotMurder, although there's a lot more to the plot than just that one trope.

* AdaptationalJobChange: In the book, Guy is an up-and-coming architect; Anne is a fashion designer. In the movie, Guy is an amateur tennis star with political aspirations; no career is indicated for Anne.

* SpiritualSuccessor: Once again, Farley Granger plays a nervous man who gets wrapped up in a psychopath's murder scheme in a Hitchcock film loaded with HomoeroticSubtext, just like in ''Theatre/{{Rope}}''.
* StrangersOnATrainPlotMurder: {{Trope Namer|s}}, and an UnbuiltTrope: Guy laughs Bruno's suggestion off as a joke, only to discover that Bruno is all too serious. [[spoiler:In the end, Guy doesn't go through with it -- in the movie, at least.]]

* AdaptationalUgliness: Bruno's mother is a mild case. In the book, she has many male admirers and maintains a youthful appearance. Bruno is specifically proud of her for having the ''legs'' of a much younger woman. In the movie, she looks realistically like a woman in her sixties. [[AdaptationalModesty We never get a look at her legs.]]