While the City Sleeps is a 1956 film directed by Fritz Lang and starring Dana Andrews, Rhonda Fleming, George Sanders, Howard Duff, Thomas Mitchell, Vincent Price, John Drew Barrymore and Ida Lupino.
Written by Casey Robinson, the newspaper drama was based on The Bloody Spur by Charles Einstein, which was inspired by the case of Chicago serial killer William Heirens (a.k.a.
The "Lipstick Killer").
(The film even alludes to the crimes of Heirens in the script's dialogue, suggesting that the film's antagonist, also known as the "Lipstic Killer", is a copycat killer.)[1] Five decades after the film's release, critic Dennis Schwartz wrote, "Fritz Lang ('M') directs his most under-appreciated great film, more a social commentary than a straight crime drama."
