double indemnity

Double Indemnity
Directed by: Billy Wilder
Screenplay by Billy Wilder and Raymond Chandler
Based on the novel by James M. Cain
Copyright 1944 by Universal Pictures
Cast: Fred McMurray, Barbara Stanwyck, Edward G. Robinson

They say the greatest film noir ever made is Billy Wilder’s Double Indemnity (1944). And perhaps, the one that would become the barometer of the array of films that carry a similar theme and atmosphere.

Walter Neff played by Fred McMurray arrives at a stuccoed Spanish mansion owned by an oil magnate, in the hope of getting him to affix the renewal papers for a lapsed auto insurance. Instead, he is greeted by the other half, Phyllis Dietrichson (Stanwyck), who emerges partially-wrapped in what Cain would write in his novel as “house pajamas”. From their initial rendezvous, a chemistry is sparked; a flame ignites without the likelihood of getting it extinguished. Furthermore, it would consume Neff with a backdraft of seduction and the avoidable, yet, foreseeable act of murder.

“I Did It For the Woman”
Double Indemnity put on-screen the pulpiness of pulp fiction. It was made at a time of cinematic purity, when less-than-moral elements such as infidelity and/or murder were considered inappropriate for a morally-staunched America. But behind the façade of a spit-shined image of a country then embroiled in a World War, the proliferated pulps of Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett and James M. Cain had transformed the public perception of the literary culture.

Cain’s femme fatale, Phyllis, the strikingly beautiful yet nefariously-scheming blonde, is surprisingly different from what the novel had described her. She is more submissive, the aggression reveals a personality capable of creating a monster out of someone ordinary—in this case, the unwilling victim of her venomous appeal is the unknowing insurance agent Walter Neff. She is definitive manipulator, so to speak, a forlorn woman scathed by the circumstances of her marriage that her decision of murder further elevates one’s sympathy for her to exploit.

Neff’s descriptive narration proves a likely revelation of Phyllis Dietrichson, even at the beginning of the film.

"It was mid-afternoon, and it's funny, I can still remember the
smell of honeysuckle all along that block. I felt like a million.
There was no way in all this world I could have known that murder
sometimes can smell like honeysuckle..."

Love, as Neff would subconsciously discover later, turns someone into a completely helpless sucker.

“I Did It For the Money”
Most film noirs revolve around an individual’s appetite for money. Whether it is a primary or a secondary need, it contributes to the whole spectrum of the plot. People would kill for money. The root of all evil, they say, but the catalyst for the desire to commit such a deplorable deed.

The title refers to a specific clause on insurance policies as a come-on for prospective clients. It meant that the agency would pay twice the contract’s face value on cases of accidental death. In the film, the double indemnity is the hundred-thousand dollar equivalent if the cause of death occurs near/in/on a railroad track. Committing the crime, as it turns out, depends on a flawless blueprint. Perhaps one aspect of most successful noirs is its ability to magnify the process of planning to build-up the suspense later on.

Albeit a sinister theme, the film does not divert from the usual crime does not pay cliché. There is the overall atmosphere of a perfect crime, but it would not be, because of the presence of Neff’s superior, Barton Keyes (Robinson), who, for the most part of the film relies on his internal little man to check out hunches. It is Keyes who will provide the suspense and the one who will counterbalance a probable hackneyed resolution. He follows his intuitions and although the weight of suspicion almost brings him to discover the identity of the perpetrators, Keyes dismisses the rationality of it.

Which probably explains his relationship with Neff. Their affinity extends the extra mile that he will stick out his neck for Neff, but he will not allow Neff to get away with it. Their complex friendship is not just caused by the length of their acquaintance, but perhaps of one’s recognition and respect for the other—evidently illustrated by Neff’s incessant act of lighting Keyes’ cigar.

Double Indemnity also trudges the subject of sexuality, though without the graphic vulgarities that would pepper a similarly-themed movie of the 80s or 90s (think Kasdan’s Body Heat or the Rafelson remake of The Postman Always Rings Twice). It is interesting to note of Neff’s flirtations with Phyllis, but at the same time we are treated to brain itches, instead. We are left with questions of the consummation of their affair, however, Wilder would only leave us with mere insinuations.

Raymond Chandler supplied the immediacy of the dialogues, which were particularly engaging, in view of the fact of his background on the genre. However, it was Wilder’s prestidigitating hand that fit that pieces, with references to early German expressionistic styles that he would deny on later interviews regarding the film. Double Indemnity opened up an entire new dimension on the art of filmmaking, particularly on the breaking of taboos that for years had precluded an existing literary form to be recognized.