Marilyn Monroe portrait painting

 Niagara is an American 1953 film noir thriller film directed by Henry Hathaway, and starring Marilyn Monroe, Joseph Cotten, Jean Peters, and Max Showalter. It was one of Fox’s biggest box office hits of the year.

Unlike other film noirs of the time, Niagara was filmed in “three-strip” Technicolor (one of the last films to be made at Fox in that format, as a few months later Fox began converting to CinemaScope, which had compatibility problems with “three-strip” but not with Eastmancolor).

Monroe was given first billing in Niagara which elevated her to star status. Her following two films of that year, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, with Jane Russell, and How to Marry a Millionaire, with Betty Grable and Lauren Bacall, were even bigger successes.