STRANGERS ON A TRAIN

(June 1951, U.S.)

Every once in a while, like a drug, I need to revisit, re-experience and re-absorb the work of Alfred Hitchcock, particularly the work that doesn't necessarily involve Cary Grant, James Stewart or a butcher knife in a shower. STRANGERS ON A TRAIN was a relatively late discovery for me and I first became aware of it through a rather unlikely source; it's brief cameo mention in a rather stupid 1987 comedy called THROW MOMMA FROM THE TRAIN (sometimes movies work that way).

The story, based on the original story by Patricia Highsmith, concerns two strangers who meet on a train, a young tennis player named Guy Haines (played by Farley Granger) and a charming (and possibly homosexual) psychopath named Bruno Antony (played by Robert Walker). During the course of their bizarre conversation, Bruno suggests that because they each want to "get rid" of someone, they should "swap murders", so that neither of them can get caught due to lack of suspicion and motive of killing a total stranger. Guy would love to see his cheating, double-crossing wife Miriam dead because she's refusing to grant him the divorce he needs to marry his new sweetheart Anne Morton, who also happens to be the prominent daughter of a U.S. senator. Bruno would love to see his father dead simply because he hates him. While Guy doesn't take the conversation seriously, he humors Bruno long enough by pretending to find the whole thing amusing. Bruno, however, interprets Guy's amusing response as a solid agreement to go along with the scheme. By the time the entire encounter is over, Guy has accidentally left behind his monogrammed lighter for Bruno to retrieve and even use against him later on in the film.

Now on a mission of murder, Bruno tracks down Miriam and follows her to a local carnival, where he eventually strangles her. This scene of murder is particularly inventive in the way that Hitchcock shoots it on a double printing technique, through the point of view of Miriam's black and white glasses lens, having fallen to the grass in front of her. Take a look...

Once the awful deed is done, Bruno insists on payment from Guy, who has no intention of killing Bruno's father in return. While being devilishly charming throughout the entire experience, Bruno is, nonetheless, a psychotic who won't take no for an answer and expects Guy to fulfill his obligation and proceeds to follow and harass Guy all over town of Washington D.C. Brought to the point of desperation, Guy inevitably pretends to agree to Bruno's original plan and attempts to warn Bruno's father by creeping into his bedroom while he sleeps. As one might suspect, Bruno is in the bed instead and finally realizes that Guy has no intention of going through with what he though was a legitimate agreement between two strangers on a train. From this moment through the remainder of the film, Bruno will use Guy's lighter to set him up for Miriam's murder and Guy must stop him. This is where Hitchcock uses the game of tennis to build the tension of time running out and working against Guy in order to clear his name of any crime. We watch the game as we would any other sporting event on film, knowing full well, however, that if Guy doesn't win the match quickly, he may very well go to jail for murder. It's subtle tension, but Hitchcock knows just how to work it to the advantage of gripping his audience. Still, even subtle tension must often build itself to the point of a more hardcore climax. At the carnival where Miriam was murdered, Guy and Bruno face each other on an out-of-control merry-go-round up until the last moment when Guy's name is cleared by the revelation of his lighter tucked into the palm of Bruno's cold, dead hand.

It's interesting to know that in the American version of STRANGERS ON A TRAIN, the final scene shows Guy reunited with Anne on a train home. A minister, who's also a tennis fan, recognizes Guy and attempts to strike up a conversation, but remembering the trouble he got into by talking to a stranger like Bruno on a train, Guy and Anne leave the train car.

Hitchcock repeatedly loved the theme of the ordinary man caught up in a web of fear and circumstances he cannot control and will have to fight to survive. A man like Bruno Antony is fiendishly effective because it's his quiet and persistent charm and patience that makes him all the more frightening and dangerous. The film, while not particularly fast or exciting, is still woven with a very wicked style and a certain degree of deliciousness, making it one of Hitchcock's most entertaining thrillers. Watch carefully the scene where Guy arrives home to his apartment building only to discover Bruno lurking in the shadows across the street not long after he killed Miriam. This is a rendezvous Guy cannot possibly comprehend because he never took Bruno's proposal on the train seriously to begin with. A deed has been done, a pair of glasses is delivered as the receipt of that deed, and now payment is expected. This scene effectively symbolizes just who Guy and Bruno are and the twisted relationship they've gotten themselves into. And while not officially designated as film noir, Hitchcock's use of light and darkness manages to give his two main character the proper overlapping qualities of good and evil.

Favorite line or dialogue:

Bruno Anthony: "Everyone has somebody that they want to put out of the way. Oh, now surely, Madam, you're not going to tell me that there hasn't been a time that you didn't want to dispose of someone. Your husband, for instance?"