History YMMV / StrangersOnATrain

* SugarWiki/FunnyMoments: while Bruno is stalking Miriam, a little kid walks up to him pointing a toy gun and says "Bang, bang!" Bruno just gives him a blank look for a moment. As the kid leaves, Bruno pops his balloon with his cigarette and the kid gives him this unbelieving look.

* HoYay: Bruno's plan would have worked - had he not been so ''interested'' in Guy. This is ''doubly'' true in the book.

** Bruno strangles Miriam, a woman that he never met before and his motivation to use it plunges him even further down. He plots to mastermind the murder of his own father, just because he restricts his clearly unhinged freedom.
** The policemen are depicted in the worst way possible even compared to the rest of Creator/AlfredHitchcock's filmography. While chasing after Guy who is a prime suspect by that point, they choose to actually ''shoot him in the back'' breaking all rules concerning law enforcement as: 1) he is not proven guilty yet and their position doesn't allow them to reach a verdict, 2) he is not armed and therefore it qualifies as cold-blooded murder of a possibly innocent man and 3) he is in a crowded area which can and does lead to the death of ''another'' innocent man.

*** What makes it especially scary is just how ''sudden'' it is. Miriam turns around, Bruno briefly illuminates the scene with Guy's cigarette lighter as he asks if she's Miriam, and she barely gets out a word confirming this when he starts strangling her. The scene is also frighteningly quiet, with only the carnival music playing in the background as Bruno chokes her to death--even worse, the music apparently becomes the soundtrack to murder in Bruno's mind, since it starts playing again in a later scene when he nearly strangles a different woman while giving a DeathGlare to Babs, who happens to resemble Miriam.
** After Guy's alibi falls through and he receives a police tail, he's walking with Detective Hennessey and making small-talk when, in the distance, he sees Bruno just ''standing there'', watching him ominously. The psycho side of him is starting to come out again....

* 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.

* 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}}''.