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Double Indemnity (1944)
 
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Director:
Billy Wilder |
COUNTRY
USA |
GENRE
Crime/Thriller |
NORWEGIAN TITLE
- |
RUNNING
TIME
106
minutes |
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Producer:
Joseph Sistrom |
Screenwriter
(based on a book by James M. Cain):
Billy Wilder
Raymond Chandler |
Review
This classic noir,
penned by the not so harmonic couple Billy Wilder and Raymond Chandler,
is so tight and industrious that we just cannot help ignoring the cheesy
narration and the snappy, overly clever dialogue. The film is the
smuggest of the classic noirs, but arguably also among the most engaging and
well-directed as Wilder brings on the setup in the most delicate of
manners before keeping us on the edge of our seats through playful
shifts in the balance of power. Our protagonist, Walter Neff, is the
self-assured insurance salesman for whom everything has come easy in life. And it seems this trend will continue when he meets the sexy,
alluring Phyllis Dietrichson. Against Neff's cocky manner, her gentle
nature and seductive ideas seem forgiving, almost ethical. This moral
ambiguity is cleverly discussed by Wilder, who controls the audience
almost cynically in order to be able to reap his rewards. The most
remarkable feat is how the film manages to maintain a high level of
suspense seemingly without hiding anything. Barbara Stanwyck's Mrs.
Dietrichson is the most believable and sympathetic of the era's femme
fatales, and Edward G. Robinson is the funny and unlikely voice of
reason in a career best performance.
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