In order to expand my cinematic horizons, I have been writing short reviews for one movie for every year since 1940. For 1951, I'm delving back into the world of Alfred Hitchcock, who is shaping up to be one of my favourite directors of all time.
My classic movie diary so far:
1940: Rebecca
1941: Citizen Kane
1942: There Was A Father
1943: The Ox-Bow Incident
1944: Laura
1945: Brief Encounter
1946: It's A Wonderful Life
1947: Monsieur Verdoux
1948: Rope
1949: The Third Man
1950: Rashomon
Strangers on a Train is a crime thriller directed by Alfred Hitchcock, starring Farley Granger, Ruth Roman and Robert Walker. It centres around a tennis player called Guy Haines who meets a mysterious man called Bruce Antony in a chance encounter on the train. Bruce explains a plan he has thought about where two strangers would agree to kill someone the other wants dead, hence allowing them to get away with murder. Guy wants his estranged wife out of the way allowing him to marry his girlfriend while Bruce wants nothing more than to kill his hated father. It seems to be the perfect arrangement and Bruce is intent that Guy comply with the plan...
Like all of Hitchcock's films, Strangers on a Train benefits from a compelling 'hook' (what if two strangers helped each other commit murder?) made even more memorable by the director's uncanny flair for creating tension and indelible visuals. Moments like the fairground murder, shown through a reflection in the victim's glasses with upbeat carnival music in the background are unforgettable and genius. This music comes back to haunt Bruce throughout the film and is one of my favourite motifs.
Other memorable imagery includes a crowd of people watching a tennis match, everyone's heads swivelling from left to right apart from one man. In another scene, Bruce stands behind the bars of a gate whilst attempting to corrupt the main character. This visual flair makes the antagonist of the film, Bruce, very memorable in stark contrast to a disappointingly bland leading man.
There are parts of the story that were a little lacking- the murder of Guy's wife seemed not to emotionally impact anyone, for example. Then there's the main character, with whom I could never fully empathise with and which therefore drained the tension from an extended tennis match scene near the finale.
Incidentally, thinking about the context of the time period is interesting. As explored in David Fincher's Mindhunters, the idea of a serial killer who murders randomly without a clear cut motivation was not widely known during the 1950's and therefore nearly every murder needed to have an associated motivation, whether that be love, money or rivalry. (Indeed, the term 'serial killer' would not be coined until the 1970's.) As such, the perceived genius of the central concept in Strangers on a Train can feel a little outdated given the current pop culture craze with the true crime genre.
Of course, that's just an incidental and arbitrary thought but what's even more intriguing is how Hitchcock might have changed the story if he were not held back by the more restrictive film-making morals of the time. Perhaps Stranger on a Train might have been a little more thrilling if both characters had agreed to the double murder, instead of Guy being a reluctant party. This censorship severely messed with another of Hitchcock's movies, Suspicion, where the audiences of the time could not accept Cary Grant portrayed in a negative light.
All in all, Strangers on a Train may not be my favourite Hitchcock story (Psycho, Notorious and Rear Window still hold that title), but the genius of the director's style- especially in the first carnival scene- is a pleasure to watch even if the plot itself is nothing special.
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I do not own any of the images used in this post.