In the film Vertigo, the character of Scotty is trying to undersatnd how Judy, a woman he has just met, so closely resembles his dead love Madeline. After following Judy to her home at the Empire Hotel, he goes to her door where he confronts her to see if she is a hallucination, like others he has seen, or an actual dead ringer for Madeline. As an example of Mise-en-scene through prop placement, the positioning of the door during Scotty and Judy's first encounter at the hotel alludes to her duplicity and that her relationship with Scotty may be more than it appears.
As Judy opens the door to Scotty, she carefully places herself behind the door, but not entirely. She appears to be split down the middle by the door. The angle from which Scotty and the audience is viewing her shows only half her body with a sliver of apartment behind her, with the other half of the
The door serves as a clue to audience that something isn't quite right with Judy and entryway for Scotty and Judy to engage in a volatile relationship. At this point in the story Scotty is hiding very little from Judy while she is withholding a startling truth from him. As we see Scotty framed in an open doorway, an apparently grief-stricken, obsessed and broken man we contrast that to Judy emerging halfway from behind a doorway, only to literally stick her neck out of it. The door serves as a shield to hide Judy's lies and as an entryway into a world where Scotty can lie to himself, at least until he uncovers the truth.
Her once-intimate relationship to Scotty is evident by her stance with the door. She allows the door to rest on her with head and neck exposed in a careless and inviting way. This is not at all the cautious stance one should take with a stranger. The edge of the door, whil
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