A review on Double Indemnity by me, perhaps to enhance your viewing, should anybody watch it on TCM tonight...

Double Indemnity
Dir. by: Billy Wilder
Country: USA
Year: 1944
Running time: 103 minutes

“I never knew that murder could smell like honeysuckle.”

Film noir was a term first coined by the French critics of the mid-forties who, at the end of World War II, saw for the first time the influx of American crime films, in which they saw many recurring ingredients. The term film noir itself translates to “black film,” a reference to the defining ingredient of the new-found genre: darkness. Not only were the films physically set almost entirely at night, but the tone of the plot would also involve deception, corruption, and crime of the highest order, a murder most unspeakable and vices unrepeatable. The aesthetic approach was a combination of French poetic realism and German expressionism. The plots were complex, often presented in flashback, with voiceover, told from the male protagonist’s point of view: the detective, private eye or cynical tough man who, upon meeting a mysterious, ambiguous female lead, was lead on a downward journey which only unravelled fully at the disastrous climax.

This is the first of three Wilder masterpieces which made the MFA Top 100. ¹ It would of course be impossible to choose one masterpiece as his most definitive; but Double Indemnity must be close. The film is also, along with The Maltese Falcon (1941), and Farewell My Lovely and Laura of 1944, the epitome of the genre.

Walter Neff (that’s two F’s, like Filadelfia) is an insurance salesman, and by the look and sound of it, one who won’t last much longer. Talking into his Dictaphone, he tells claims adjustor Barton Keyes of his doomed affair with Phyllis Dietrichson. Through flashback, we learn that Neff’s client Mr. Dietrichson doesn’t like insurance. But Neff has fallen in love with Mrs. Dietrichson, and will do anything for her—even when she suggests they murder her husband and claim on the insurance. It all goes right up to a point, but this is film noir, and there are no happy endings. Things soon derail and go all wrong…

It seems odd that, since Raymond Chandler co-wrote the script, the plot is a simple one—that is, at least you can follow it. But that doesn’t mean it’s any worse. On the contrary, Chandler and Wilder’s script gives way to fewer, fuller characters who drive the sinister narrative along through the planning an execution of the murder itself, and then in the nail biting aftermath, in which Keyes creeps in on them like a determined predator, and Neff and Dietrichson’s loyalty to each other is pushed to the limit.

The script (based on James Cain’s novel), as those of you familiar with Chandler can imagine, is full of typically hardboiled cynicism. Memorable lines, repartees and first-person voice over are peppered throughout; Neff and Phyllis’ flirting by means of an extended metaphor of a speeding motorist is a notable highlight. Complimenting such a fine screenplay is Wilder’s archetypal directing: the cold, dispassionate standpoint, firm and assured, and frustratingly sweeping in its manipulative handling of the narrative and our constant projection into it.

And of course, with such a classic noir, cinematography is a must. Without it, Wilder’s directing would have been wasted. John Seitz’s black and white photography is astounding and goes hand-in-hand with the direction to capture the Chandleresque setting of a corrupt Los Angeles. Sharp camera angles, distant at time and appropriately up close at others, help to make the film simultaneously stylistic and realistic. Not many films can do that. Stark shadows are evident throughout, another classic trademark of the genre, and of course the light slicing into characters’ faces and bodies through half-shut Venetian blinds. Fantastic. Miklos Rozsa’s musical score never puts a note wrong: exciting, intense and complimentary throughout.

As fantastic as the direction is, as masterful as the script is, as archetypal as the cinematography and score are, the film wouldn’t be half as good without the acting, notably that of the three main stars. Fred MacMurray holds the piece together with an inspired performance as Neff, a character whose anti-hero was virtually an hitherto unknown concept. He could have easily played Marlowe in a Chandler adaptation. His loner yearning for a challenge is played to perfection. Complimenting the role is Barbara Stanwyck as the femme fatale, clad in a fake blonde wig and wearing a dangerously attractive anklet.

But Edward G. Robinson, as Neff’s companion Keyes, steals the show. Rattling off lines with lip-smacking relish, he offers brilliant and welcome comic relief in an otherwise dark study of human evil. Pun intended, he’s quite simply unmatched…

Much like Wilder, and the film itself.

Thanks for reading,
Mick
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1. = The other two Wilder films on the list are Sunset Boulevard (1950) and Some Like It Hot (1959).