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 shot taken up my the door. This concealment of half her body and half of the shot triggers the audience to wonder what it is she is hiding, either behind the door or in the other half of herself. Judy also places one hand on the outside of the door and one hand on the inside of the door, causing them to oppose one another when Scotty pushes on the door as he begs to be let in. Her counterproductive back-and-forth manipulation of the door indicates her struggle to deiced if she should tell Scotty the truth or continue with her deceit. .
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, while resting straight down her middle, actually accentuates her curves as she leans towards Scotty. While she protests for him to leave her cradling of the door with her body, clad in the very same shade of green Madeline wore, says otherwise.
