Alfred Hitchcock/Strangers on a Train

## Plot

Guy and Bruno both struggle with a past that hinders them from a better future. When they meet as *strangers on a train*, Bruno suggest they swap murders, since they would not be suspects as they have no connection with each other. Guy laughs it off, but Bruno takes it as confirmation. Thus Bruno murders Miriam expects Guy to return the favor.

Guy tries avoiding him, until Bruno forces him to acknowledge him by coming out into the open. Bruno sends a drawn map leading to his father's bedroom, attached with a key. When he crashes a party at Anne's house, he pretends to strangle a woman as a joke, until he sees Barbara and relives the moment he killed Miriam. At another party, he playfully discuss the perfect murder with Mrs. Cunningham. He borrows her neck to demonstrate a quiet way to murder someone, but when he sees Barbara, he forgets himself and accidentally begins strangling the old lady for real. Bystanders steps in to release the lady, upon which Bruno faints.

Anne confronts Guy, who tells her the truth that Bruno is blackmailing him. Eventually, Guy sneaks into Bruno's home and confronts Bruno, returning the key and gun. Anne visits Mrs. Antony to tell her the truth, but wasn't able to convince her before Bruno walks in.

The detective waits until Guy's tennis match completes before taking him in as a suspect. Elsewhere, Bruno drops his cigarette case down the storm drain. He tries to get assistance, but ends up having to stick his hand down the grailing himself to reclaim it. Barbara distracts the detective, as Guy flees on a taxi with them in hot pursuit. He escapes into the train station, where they let him escape and decides to trail him instead, in hopes of leading them to something bigger.

Back at the amusement park, Bruno learns that the murder site has turned into something of a tourist attraction. Although dismissively considering it a morbid way to make money, he eventually enters the line himself, planning to plant Guy's cigarette lighter at the murder site as evidence. Guy too makes his way to the amusement park, closely tailed by the detectives. Seeing the detectives, Bruno leaves the line. When Guy calls out to him, Bruno jumps onto the merry go around. The detectives accidentally shoots the conductor, causing the carousel to go amok, while Guy and Bruno exchange blows. When the carousel is stopped, Guy reveals the truth to the detective and they confront Bruno a final time.

## Characters

Guy Haines
Pro tennis star who plans to enter politics once his tennis career is through.
*popular, handsome, athletic, successful.*
Bruno Antony
Odd but charming stranger who hates his neglectful father. Psychopathic socialite.
*Weird, repressed, unloved, crazy, lunatic.*
Miriam Joyce Haines
Guy's wife. She was impregnated by another man, but refused to divorce Guy.
*A nag.*
Anne Morton
Guy's girlfriend
*Warm, compassionate.*
Barbara Morton
Anne's sister with a remarkably similar appearance to Miriam.
Mrs. Cunningham
Old lady that Bruno talks with at a party, discussing the perfect murder. While demonstrating how to strangle someone without allowing them to scream out, he enters a trance upon seeing Barbara and almost strangles her to death.
Mrs. Antony
Bruno's mother.
Detective Hennessey
One of the two detectives responsible for investigating Miriam's murder.
Sen. Morton
Prof. Collins
Mrs. Anderson
## Themes

Doubles
Tennis as a back and forth exchange of a ball.
Two ladies, two bespectacled women, two respectable influential fathers, two sisters, two detectives, two cities, two little boys at the fairground, two old men at a carousel, etc.
*Crisscross, crossing one's double, double crossing, swaps, counterparts, ~~Like two sides of a coin~~, couples, deja vu*
Strangers
Doppelgangers
Guy and Bruno are in many ways doubles mirroring each other, but also opposites as reactor and actor respectively.
The perfect murder
As strangers without any connection with each other, Guy and Bruno would not be considered suspects in each other's investigations, and in swapping murders, they would gain a perfect alibi.
Trance
When Bruno murdered Miriam, he lighted a *lighter* in front of her eyes, the fire of which reflected in her *glasses*, as the tivoli music played in the background. Afterwards, he brings the glasses to Guy to prove his deed. Afterwards, whenever he sees Barbara, he enters a trance of the night he murdered Miriam, with the lighter reflected in Barbara's glasses as the same *tivoli* music plays in the background.
Lighter
Smokers often ask each other for a favor, such as asking the other to light their cigarette for them.
Train
Once aboard, you can't stop or step off until you've arrived at your destination.
Merry go Around
A carousel.
*Loosing the reins of the horse, ~~trampled by a stampede~~*
Strangling
When Guy and Anne learns the truth behind Miriam's murder, both end up acting guilty and suspicious. After killing Miriam, Bruno expects Guy to repay the favor in kind, blackmailing him to keep quiet. In the last scene, Bruno tries pretending Guy was an accomplice in front of the officers, until the truth was revealed with the appearance of Guy's lighter in Bruno's loosening grasp.
Lunacy