Strangers on a Train (1951), directed by Alfred Hitchcock.
I suppose everyone knows this famous criss-cross murder story adapted from Patricia Highsmith's first book, published when she was 29 years old. I'll just list assorted notes made after an umpteenth viewing, my first time on Blu-ray.
Chatty, charming psycho Bruno careens through the movie with no one to stop him. Everyone knows he's crazy and several see he is dangerous. Nonetheless we like him and Robert Walker is great in the role.
Our hero, Guy, is bland by comparison and Farley Granger is a bland actor. This makes us less attached to him and we are never entirely on his side.
We have no reason to like his scheming wife Miriam but she is more interesting than the perfect fiancée, the senator's daughter. We dread watching her flirt with Death at the amusement park and don't actually believe the murder will occur. Until it does. (Killing a pregnant woman in film must have been unusual at the time).
We see cause for Miriam's resentment of Guy's perfect new life with the rich and glamorous.
Bruno has given Guy what he wanted: freedom. Does Guy secretly feel he owes something in return, even if the original criss-cross bargain was a misunderstanding?
Note how harmful the authorities and normal people are: the police shoot an innocent man at the carousel, and when the old man crawls under it to stop the runaway machine he causes the crash!
Stampeding carousel horses! The kids love it.
Truffaut points out that Hitchcock will use a pre-shock incident to put us off-balance during the moments of suspense. He mentions the big dog on the stairway. We had been certain that Guy wasn't really going to kill Bruno's father, but after he gets past the dog we have second thoughts.
Another example from the other direction would be the screaming in the amusement park tunnel of love which turns to laughter. We are disarmed before the actual sudden murder on the island.
Hitchcock was not happy with either Farley Granger or Ruth Roman. I'm not sure why in her case: she seemed to be doing the job. He also thought the dialog could have been stronger.
Dimitri Tiomkin score
Available on Blu-ray, quite decent looking. The black levels are not very consistent, but I suspect that matches the film itself. A commentary track is patched together from a variety of interviews. The disc includes a standard definition "preview cut"; the differences are said to be minor.