Hollywood Locks

There’s this program on Showtime that makes my life difficult. It’s called “Dexter”. Up until now it only aired on a premium channel, which has mitigated the amount of trouble it could cause me. However, it recently broadcast its final episode and I imagine it will soon start to run in syndication on TBS. Then my life will be very difficult.

For those of you who haven’t seen the program, the titular character is a serial killer. But don’t worry. He’s a good serial killer. He has a code. He only kills bad people. He often has to break into their homes to search their computers and basements for evidence that they are bad enough for him to serial kill. For getting into their homes, he has a set of lock picks. The program frequently depicts him approaching the front door of his would-be victim’s house in broad sunny Miami daylight, picks in hand. This would be incredibly audacious if he didn’t live in TV Land. In TV Land, lock picks are exactly like keys, in that they function just as quickly and easily as keys, and they are guaranteed to work seamlessly every time. That’s why just as soon as the picks appear, Dexter can be seen breezing into the house.

In reality, picking a lock is not just a matter of having the tools to do it. With many locks, it can be a delicate and painstaking process that requires intense focus and quite a bit of time, something akin to threading a needle in the dark. I’ve picked many hundreds of locks, yet every time I pull my picks from my front pocket to open a door, my heart rate rises a little. I get nervous. There’s no way of knowing how long it will take me to open the lock with my picks, or whether it’s even within my capacity to do so. Never am I more nervous than when someone is hovering behind me watching, impatiently expecting the door to swing open. Nervousness can compel a lot of people to pick a lot of things: scabs, noses, sometimes even arguments. But I can assure you, dear reader, that it does not make me a more proficient picker of locks. It has just the opposite effect.

It isn’t the customers’ fault that they believe their locks should be picked in a matter of seconds. That’s what every televised depiction of lock picking they’ve ever seen has led them to reasonably expect. And I can’t exactly blame the makers of Dexter for devoting too little airtime to Dexter’s lockpicking efforts. Showing a man crouch uncomfortably in front of a door for anything more than three seconds would make for very boring television. And it’s not my fault that I don’t get to perform my job in TV Land. Nobody did anything wrong here. Still, I think my life would be better in a world without Dexter, and I hope TBS doesn’t pick up the show.

Old Ways

Back in the days when I was learning this trade in Mexico, the maestro in the shop would teach me how to hand-fabricate parts to broken locks. Knowing that I would someday be practicing my trade in the States, I would arrogantly say that I didn’t need to know how to do these things. “In my country, we would throw it out and buy a new one!”

So yesterday I felt a twinge of shame when a customer brought me a baggie full of loose metal pieces that were once the lock to his antique curio. What was I going to do — throw out his lock and tell him to go to Ethan Allen for a new china cabinet? I had to fix it, and thanks to the maestro I knew exactly how to reassemble the lock and replicate the lost springs with pieces of special scrap metal I’d been holding onto. When I was done, the lock was as good as new. The job left me feeling happily nostalgic and I had to write a note of thanks to the maestro.

Film Review: The Locksmith (2010)

I’m no film critic, so I’ll start by reviewing not the movie, but the work of Mike, the fictional locksmith portrayed therein.

Another thing that I’m not is a felon. In reality, Mike’s character would have a hard time getting bonded and licensed as a locksmith in Washington State. I wonder if there’s a single state that allows people on parole to work in this trade.

So it’s not surprising that both his work and his demeanor leave something to be desired. Early in the film he opens a door without confirming that it belongs to the woman requesting the service, and it turns out that it does not. That’s foolish and unprofessional. This is typical poor decision-making from a man with a proven record of making terrible life choices. It also happens to be one of my recurring nightmares. When I’m not dreaming that I forgot to turn in the final paper for a core high school credit and that my diploma is being revoked, I’m dreaming that I’ve just let a burglar into a house that is not his. When I’m awake, I always remember to ask for identification.

But what bothers me more about Mike the locksmith is that he demonstrates not an ounce of sympathy for his customers. It’s always a bad day when you have to call a locksmith. The least the locksmith could do is be friendly. In one scene, Mike looks at a simple cylinder that an average locksmith could easily open with a pick, and immediately says that it needs to be drilled. He doesn’t even make an attempt to save the customer money by opening the lock in a nondestructive fashion. The customer protests, but he reaches for his drill as if she doesn’t have a choice. This is a lazy and wasteful way of doing business. To his credit, his pricing seems pretty reasonable.

Locksmith rating: 3/10

The film itself is maddening to watch. Time and again, when faced with the simplest of choices, Mike chooses the one that is most obviously wrong. I can imagine that his parade of increasingly dumb decisions would be fun to watch if it were broken up with some comic relief, but there’s nothing funny about this movie. And as a locksmith, watching the movie made me terribly anxious. Mike spends his entire workday gallivanting around with a crazy lady, entrusting his service vehicle and equipment to her, and ignoring service calls. Throughout the entire movie, I just wanted him to get back to work. What’s worse is that he repeatedly places himself into awkward (but not amusing) social situations, all to humor this marginally attractive kook who has taken an interest in him. I would call the movie relentlessly uncomfortable if it weren’t for the very boring stretches.

Film rating: 5/10