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Inhibitory Hallucinations In Fritz Lang's Scarlet Street

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In Fritz Lang’s Scarlet Street (1945), Christopher Cross (Edward G. Robinson), a cashier and amateur painter, receives a watch from his employer in honor of his twenty-five years of work. After leaving the party, Christopher witnesses as Kitty (Joan Bennet) being attacked, Christopher stuns the attacker – who is actually Kitty’s boyfriend, Johnny (Dan Duryea) - and once he helps Kitty up, he falls instantly in love with her. Christopher accompanies Kitty all the way to her apartment. Outside of Kitty’s apartment, Christopher offers Kitty a cup of coffee and Kitty accepts. As they begin to talk about themselves, Christopher pulls out the watch that his employer gave him and mentions that he is a painter; Kitty begins to think that Christopher …show more content…

The background music playing in this scene parallels and mimics Christopher’s auditory hallucinations. Christopher’s auditory hallucinations consists of Kitty and Johnny tormenting him for killing them and uniting them forever in death. Kitty’s and Johnny’s voices are not loud, instead they are quiet and sound more like whispers. At first Christopher notices his hallucinations, but believes that they aren’t anything serious, but directly addresses them as soon as Kitty and Johnny begin to mock him. Lang decided to give the audience the ability to be able to hear Christopher’s hallucinations, as if the audience was also going crazy, as any sane person would not simply hear Kitty’s and Johnny’s voices. The non-diegetic music continues to play at a subtle volume, until Christopher can no longer take it and the camera focuses on a chandelier and at the same time, the music’s volume increase and changes the tone from subtle to dramatic, suggesting Christopher hanging

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