Is this the movie where the serial killer comes to the door as a delivery man and pops the button lock and then returns later on to kill? I know Dana Andrews is in a movie with this scenerio, just not sure which one.
Thanks.
Look no further, this is the one you are thinking of.
shareI don't get WHY the killer felt it was necessary to unlock the door. He's talking to the victim, asking if he delivered the right package from the drug store. (did he work there?) She says yes, and he pushes the button to unlock the door. One minute later he walks in and attacks her. JUST LIKE HE COULD HAVE DONE BEFORE HE UNLOCKED THE DOOR!
I think there's the hint of some eroticism here. The victim mentions that she is about to take a bath, and he was delivering (if I recall) her bath salts from the pharmacy. Shows of femininity in any context, particularly erotic ones, are triggers for the killer. Its possible that he wanted to catch her while she was in the bath, not before.
A lot of Lang's later films focus on the exploitation of women by unsympathetic male characters. In While the City Sleeps, this operates on several levels: Mildred's only way to advance in the male-dominated news industry is to expose herself as a sex object. Similarly, Kyne's wife, who is actually called Lady Macbeth at some point, tries to gain influence through sex. Edward, who spends a good deal of the film essentially begging for Sally to sleep with him (and I think its hinted that he proposes to her with this specific goal in mind) almost instantaneously gives his new bride-to-be over as bait for a serial killer, for the advancement of his career.
Parallels between Edward and the killer are drawn frequently. For instance, its Edward that later uses the button lock to intrude on Sally. Sally, later in the film, explicitly draws a comparison between the two. Lang is fairly blunt in his contempt for Edward, and the men in this film in general.
Anyway, I suppose the point is that nothing is quite so simple in a Lang film. A seemingly nonsensical detail, such as the killer using the button lock, can reveal a rich tapestry of perversion!
The killer was a nutjob, and not exactly operating on a normal level. Reason didn't appear to be one of his strong points :D He also didn't appear to be very good at running away from the cops!
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