The moral of the story is: Crime doesn’t pay. At least during the Hays Code era of Hollywood. No criminal can escape the law by the time the words “The End” grace the screen. This rule was as engrained into the production code as any that dealt with sex or violence. The movies couldn’t promote criminal activity in any way, and any evildoers had to receive sufficient punishment in the end. To some degree, that can take the energy out of a film because you know the killer or the thief is not going to elude the law, and it’s only a matter of how and when capture or death catches up to them. Yet, when handled right, that aspect of the code isn’t a hindrance at all but a tool used by the best to make excellent dramas.
No one coming out of White Heat feels that James Cagney’s Cody Jarrett didn’t deserve what he got, nor for Edward G. Robinson’s Caesar Enrico “Rico” Bandello as he lies in the street, his dying words “Is this the end of Rico” sealing a lifetime of criminal behavior. Yet, even as these characters are dying right in front of us, we feel something for them because, even though they were violent criminals, they were charismatic, too. We liked them, despite what the code was trying to make us feel. The same thing can be said for Walter Neff (Fred MacMurray), an ordinary insurance salesman caught up in a murder plot.
Walter has been in the insurance business for more than a decade at the start of the film. It’s safe to say he knows the business inside and out and would know of the many exploits a person can utilize to receive a maximum payout. When we are first introduced to him, he is stumbling into his Los Angeles office late one night, injured and perhaps dying. We immediately understand he has gotten himself involved in something seedy as he begins recording his confession into a dictaphone. Walter is wounded, but we won’t find out for some time what has led him to this.
A year earlier, Walter was making a house call, visiting with Phyllis Dietrichson (Barbara Stanwyck) about her husband’s automobile insurance. This visit turns flirtatious, and Phyllis casually inquires about getting a life insurance policy on Mr. Dietrichson (Tom Powers) without his knowledge. This question disturbs Walter, and he wants no part in it. But later, still fascinated by her, temptation gets the better of him, and he concocts a plan to have Dietrichson sign a life insurance policy without realizing it, setting him up for being murdered to cash in on that policy. Neff even finagles things so that this policy’s double indemnity clause will be triggered, paying out double in the event of a specific, and unlikely, type of death occurring. With plans in place, Phyllis kills her husband, and Walter makes it look like he fell off the back of a train and broke his neck.
No plan is perfect, though, and Neff’s boss doesn’t buy the method of death. He believes it was a suicide and wants to negotiate a substantially lower payout to the widow. Barton Keyes (Edward G. Robinson), the company’s fraud investigator, believes the case is far more sinister, though. As the case begins to unravel, Walter grows suspicious that Phyllis may attempt to eliminate him, too. On top of that, he learns that this is not the first time she has killed to get what she wants.
Part of the reason why we feel so sympathetic towards Walter, despite his complicity in murder, is because it is Fred MacMurray in the role. This primarily comes from his later work and not something that would have been nearly as strong back in 1944. Fred MacMurray is primarily known these days for his work with Disney in so many of their classic live-action films such as The Absent-Minded Professor and The Shaggy Dog. But these films were still more than a decade away when Double Indemnity premiered. MacMurray had a presence about him, even before becoming the father figure in all those Disney films, that made you want to like him; that was why Disney latched on to him so hard later in his career. It’s easy to forget that he could also play lecherous or smarmy characters with equal ease. One needs only look at his role in The Apartment to see him excel in that.
What we have in Double Indemnity is MacMurray playing a generally good man getting swept up in his own greed, being led on by a woman who is a master manipulator who sees him as someone she can easily deceive. Phyllis even admits to him that she never loved him, though she claims that that changed at the last minute when she attempts to shoot him down in the end. This confession may have saved his life had it come sooner, but by the time the two are face-to-face, fully comprehending each other for the first and last time, it is too late for both of them.
Barbara Stanwyck is the real eye-opener here. She is so good at portraying the femme fatale that we almost miss just how deftly she is manipulating Walter throughout. There is no missing the undertone of what she is asking of him when she inquires about the life insurance policy. Yet she has imbued just enough interest from Walter that he doesn’t immediately run to Keyes and report what he suspects. Instead, because of a weakness in his character, he leaves, but that conversation never leaves him, and he begins to see the possibilities of the situation: money and a beautiful woman. He should know he is being maneuvered into accessory to murder, but his lust for her blinds him to the obvious. As more information comes forward, he begins to realize this, but by that point, it is too late for him to rectify the situation. He cannot turn her in without turning himself in, and he convinces himself that he’s smarter than those who are already beginning to surround them.
We usually think of Alfred Hitchcock when it comes to the master of suspense films. But as great as Hitchcock is, he was trumped by Billy Wilder with this movie. This film is as good, and in many ways even better, than what Hitchcock was doing at the time. Hitchcock enjoys his reputations because he made so many great suspense films over a long period of time; there is no denying that. But Double Indemnity is right up there with the best Hitchcock had to offer, even surpassing them in some ways. Who is the better director is strictly a matter of opinion, so I’ll leave it at that. They both have good and bad aspects to their overall styles and filmography, and, just as Psycho and North by Northwest are near-perfect films, so too is Double Indemnity.
Billy Wilder basically set the template for film noir with this movie. So much of it is in shadows and low lighting. It also depicts California in a different light than we are used to seeing it. The California in this film is dark and rains a lot, far from the sunny skies and temperate climate we usually see in Los Angeles on the silver screen. Wilder was a master at setting the mood, and that is on full display throughout. This mood lighting extends to Barbara Stanwyck, too, who is lit in such a way as to illuminate her sinister character.
Double Indemnity is not a mystery film. We know right away who committed the crime and why. We don’t even follow the detectives or Keyes in their investigation of it; just a moment here and there from Walter’s point of view as he discovers how things are closing in around him. This could have been the perfect crime; unfortunately, a few minor uncontrollable elements contributed to sullying up the plan. The message is clear: crime doesn’t pay. We may not like the murder victim and feel no sympathy for his demise. But we also don’t condone his murder lest we be forced to look down on ourselves, too. Both Walter and Phyllis pay the ultimate price for their greed and lust. The final moment fades away to black with Keyes, having overheard enough of Walter’s confession into the dictaphone to understand what happened. It ends with Keyes offering Walter a light for his cigarette, a sign of friendship that Walter had often done for him before. Now, for the first time it’s offered in return. It’s a bittersweet moment between these two friends, one final bit of kindness.
Academy Award Nominations:
Best Motion Picture: Joseph Sistrom
Best Director: Billy Wilder
Best Actress: Barbara Stanwyck
Best Screenplay: Billy Wilder and Raymond Chandler
Best Cinematography - Black and White: John F. Seitz
Best Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture: Miklós Rózsa
Best Sound Recording: Loren Ryder
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Release Date: July 3, 1944
Running Time: 107 minutes
Not Rated
Starring: Fred MacMurray, Barbara Stanwyck, Edward G. Robinson, Porter Hall, Jean Heather, Tom Powers, Byron Barr, Richard Gaines, Fortunio Bonanova, and John Phillip
Directed By: Billy Wilder
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