Tulio Demicheli’s Un extraño en la escalera (US: The Stranger on the Stairs) takes a very common noir story (two members of a love triangle collude to murder the third) and adds unique elements like a pre-Castro Cuba setting, temporal dislocations, and an occasionally surreal gauze on the narration. The always exceptional Arturo de Córdova stars as loan officer Alberto Nuñez, who’s fallen desperately in love with new office secretary Laura (Silvia Pinal, who, coincidentally, fell in love with de Córdova during filming). The third wheel is company boss Francisco Gutiérrez (José María Linares-Rivas), who makes it a habit to degrade Nuñez whenever possible to corrupt Laura’s estimation of him, going so far as to dispatch Alberto to work in Miami (this final slight will trigger the murder plot). Andrés Soler plays a mysterious visitor whose arrival will have a profound impact on the lovers’ fates. Like many 50’s noirs, daylight replaces nocturnal shadows, but this doesn’t reduce the tension in the murder scene, which takes place twice, once in theory and once in reality. Even lacking shadows, the filmmakers create thick atmosphere in the oppressively hot, humid, fan-cooled, construction-surrounded office in which most of the action takes place (a jackhammer outside the window will be helpful in drowning out the gunshot).