Strangers on a Train

One of Hitchcock's less star-studded films (but no less the work of art or cinematic classic), 'Strangers on a Train' is a tight film of obsession, murder and chance connections (or miss-connections). Made in 1951, this film comes straight from Hitchcock's golden age of filmmaking, when the master of suspense was at the top of his game.

Guy Haines is a pro-tennis player (played by the all-round wussy Farley Grainger) looking to get into politics. He is engaged to a senator's daughter and seperated from his rather troublesome wife (who is making the prospect of divorce rather difficult for Guy). Whilst travelling on the train one day he is met by Bruno Anthony (Robert Walker, in his last performance), mummy's boy and would-be socialite, and the two strike up a rapport discussing their respective troubles... Guy's wife and Bruno's father. It's here that Bruno hits upon a brilliant idea - what if he and Guy were to murder the two bothersome individuals? The genius bit being that they would swap victims - leaving the crimes without an apparent motive.

The crux of the film is this meeting (as the title suggests). Guy takes the conversation substantially less seriously than Bruno. The problem is that you can never really tell where a stranger is coming from - it turns out that Bruno is somewhat mentally unhinged, and he follows through on the plan, believing that he and Guy have a deal. Guy is shocked and aghast at what has happened, especially when Bruno realises that Guy isn't going to follow through on his half of the 'bargain' and threatens to pin the murder of Guy's wife on Guy.

There's an inherent creepiness in the idea of worlds colliding like this... imagine a chance conversation with a stranger turning into a nightmare of murder, threats and guilt. Something like this could happen to anyone, and the terror in this film is suitably realistic as a result. This is especially compounded by Robert Walker's fantastically insane yet controlled performance as Bruno. Hitchcock's direction is also as inspired and perfectly cut as ever, notably in the final scenes at the fairground (and in one instance, the low-angle shot of a very dangerous stunt involving an old man crawling under an out-of-control merry-go-round). There's also a very unusual undercurrent of homosexuality speckled across the film (it's subtle, but it's there), which adds yet another layer to the tensions that often colour Hitchcock's films.

Another classic amongst the master's many classics.

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