THE STRANGLER (1964)

The opening shot is a close-up of an eye in which is reflected a woman in her underwear. The eye we're looking at is that of Leo Kroll, a sweaty overweight young man who has snuck into the woman's apartment and proceeds to strangle her with her own stockings. He closes her eyes and pulls a small doll out of his coat which he leaves. In the next shot, he's at home where he fondles and undresses another doll, and puts it in a drawer with seven other dolls. Indeed, this is the eighth in a series of murders that have baffled the police. Kroll, a medical lab technician, has mother issues: his mom, crippled and confined to the hospital where he works, is an oppressive terror, berating Leo mercilessly especially about his friendless and celibate state: "Even as a little boy, nobody liked you!"; "You're fat!"; "You don't make enough money to keep a good-looking hussy in stockings!" His latest victim worked as a nurse at his hospital, and he scopes out his next victim, Clara, working as his mother's nurse; the two had grown close which Leo seems to resent, and Leo kills her. On the one hand, this has an unexpected benefit: the new nurse warns Leo not to mention Clara's death to his mom on the chance that the shocking news might give her a fatal heart attack. Leo immediately goes into his mom's room, tells her about Clara, and indeed mom drops dead. On the other hand, the death of two nurses from the same hospital causes Leo to come under suspicion. Leo gets his dolls at a ring toss game at a nearby arcade where he chats with the two female workers and gets a crush on one of them, Tally. He makes the mistake of killing the other arcade worker not long after an undercover cop noticed him there (figuring that the dolls left at the scenes of the crimes came from that game), and the net tightens on Leo. The clueless Leo asks Tally to run away with him, and her rejection sends him off the deep end.

This creepy little psychological thriller was based loosely on the real-life Boston Strangler who, at the time of the film's release, was still at large. Victor Buono, who plays Leo, is the main reason to see this. He gives an uncomfortably real performance, assisted by many close-ups of his rotund, sweaty face. He frequently blinks and smirks and makes halting movements. Both Buono and Ellen Corby, who plays his mother, dare to evoke almost no sympathy for their characters. We see how Corby has fucked up her son and we despise her for it—I was almost cheering for her to die in her heart attack scene—but I felt no real sympathy for Buono, just a grudging sadness for how he turned out. The murder scenes are relatively graphic though not gratuitously so, and the whole thing has a grimy, unpleasant feel to it, helped by the black & white and low budget look of the film, undercut occasionally by odd bits of humor among the cops, mainly David McLean as the boss and Michael Ryan as his assistant. Davey Davison as Tally is the standout among the women, giving a fairly subtle performance. Diane Sayer is also good as her ill-fated co-worker. Some may feel this verges on sheer exploitation, but I think it's a bit better than that, though not a must-see except for fans of Buono. Pictured is Victor Buono at top right and Michael Ryan at left. [TCM]