Thursday, May 31, 2012

SEEN this SCENE # 3 - Strangers on a Train - The retrieval of the lighter

Movie: Strangers on a Train
Language: English
Year: 1951
Director: Alfred Hitchcock

Why it's Key: This suspenseful scene is a textbook example of Hitchcock's brilliant manipulation of viewer identification. A symbolic object that becomes critical to the plot, the cigarette lighter is introduced a few minutes into this masterful thriller, which preserves the basic premise of the original novel but adds plenty of Hitchcockish variations. 

Key Scene: Guy (Farley Granger), tennis professional, finds himself in the same train compartment as Bruno (Robert Walker), an eccentric fan who strikes up an awkwardly intimate conversation. Aware that Guy wants a divorce so that he can marry a senator's daughter, Bruno suggests that they swap murders: Bruno will kill Guy's wife if Guy will kill Bruno's father. Rattled by this proposal, Guy hastily departs, leaving behind his lighter, which Bruno pockets. A gift from his girlfriend, Ann, it bears the inscription "A to G" and is engraved with two crossed tennis rackets - a neat emblem of Bruno's "criss-cross" scheme. 

Bruno keeps his half of the perceived bargain and plans to frame Guy by placing the lighter at the scene of the murder. On his way, though, he drops the lighter down a sewer and has to retrieve it through a grating. At that moment, Guy is playing a tennis match that he must win quickly if he is to stop Bruno.

Alfred Hitchcock generates suspense by cross-cutting between both men's desperate exertions: Bruno thrusting his arm deep into the dark storm drain and Guy lunging for every ball on the sunlit court. Here Hitchcock, as usual, complicates the process of audience identification. The viewer roots for the villain to reach the lighter that he needs to incriminate the hero - a response that attests to the sly ingenuity of Hitchcock's film-making!! The video contains a detailed analysis of the scene.


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