In New York City a young woman, Judith Felton (Sandra White) is attacked and killed in her apartment. The apartment janitor, George “Pop” Pilski, had been doing some maintenance in the apartment when there was a delivery from the local pharmacy. After the superintendent left, the delivery man, Robert Manners (John Drew Barrymore), returns and kills the woman. He then writes on the wall “Ask Mother” in the woman’s lipstick. The police arrest Pilski. Watching the interrogation is Edward Mobley (Dana Andrews). Mobley is a television anchorman for Kyne Enterprises. Mobley doesn’t believe that Pilski is a killer.
Run by Amos Kyne (Robert Warwick), Kyne Enterprises operates the Sentinel newspaper and a television news station and wire service. The wire service is run by Mark Loving (Georg e Sanders), the managing editor of the paper is Jon Day Griffith (Thomas Mitchell) and the photography department for both the paper and the television program is run by Harry Kritzer (James Craig). Amos learns about the murder and is furious that his organization has been scooped by another wire service. He tells his team to play the murder up big and gives the killer a nickname, The Lipstick Killer”. The killer continues his crusade against women killing at every opportunity.
After Amos dies his estate goes to his son, Walter Kyne (Vincent Price). Walter is a rather weak leader and knows almost nothing about the news business. To compensate for his lack of skills, Walter decides to create a new position he names “Executive Director”. This way he can unload all the work on someone else but maintain all the power. Vying for the position are Loving, Griffith and Kritzer. Walter tells them that whoever catches the serial killer will get the new position. So beings a backstabbing free-for-all where secrets get exposed, lies are uncovered and alliances are formed.
In the middle of this, the killer continues his nightly haunts, and the city waits in fear for the next murder.
“While the City Sleeps” was released in 1956 and was directed by Fritz Lang. It is an American film noir. The movie was based on the 1953 novel “The Bloody Spur” by Charles Einstein. The book itself was based on a real murder that happened in Chicago in 1946 by William Heirens. Heirens killed three women and left a message in lipstick scrawled on a bathroom mirror taunting the police and daring them to catch him. He was dubbed “The Lipstick Killer”.
Howard Duff, who played Lt. Burt Kaufman and Ida Lupino who played Mildred Donner, were married in real life.
Although the movie is billed as a serial killer movie, it’s more like a journalism movie. More emphasis is placed on the personalities of the news people than on the actual murders. I would have preferred it the other way around. It’s still a well-done film with a satisfying enough ending. It incorporates some nice tension, excellent casting, and interesting plot devices into the mundane day-to-day melodrama. It’s defiantly worth viewing.