Stranger on the Third Floor (1940) on Netflix
Approved19401h 4mCrimeDramaFilm-Noir
Reporter Michael Ward's testimony convicts Joe Briggs of murder. His fiancée Jane doubts what he saw, and Ward begins to doubt it too, until a stranger appears outside his room.
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- Netflix3.9/5
- IMDb6.8/105,222 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes86%
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Plot summary
Michael Ward, a newspaper reporter, is the key witness at the murder trial of Joe Briggs: he saw Briggs standing over a man's body in a diner, and his evidence is instrumental in having Briggs found guilty. Afterward Ward's fiancée Jane wonders whether he saw what he thought he saw, and the doubt settles on Ward himself. One evening Ward notices a strange man outside his room, chases him down the stairs and out of the building, and loses him in the street. Ward hates the neighbor who shares the building, and he fears the stranger may have come for that neighbor.
Cast
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Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Stranger on the Third Floor (1940)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Stranger on the Third Floor is often cited as the first "true" film noir of the classic period (1940-1959), even though other films that fit the genre, such as Rebecca and They Drive by Night, were released earlier.
- The screenplay was credited to Frank Partos, but modern research showed that the novelist Nathanael West wrote the final version of the screenplay and went uncredited for it.
