A Place in the Sun is a 1951 American drama film loosely based on the 1925 novel An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser and the play, also titled An American Tragedy. It tells the story of a working-class young man who is entangled with two women; one who works in his wealthy uncle's factory and the other a beautiful socialite. The novel had been filmed once before, as An American Tragedy, in 1931.