Movie Review: Double Indemnity (1944)
The movie tells the story of an insurance representative (Walter Neff) who embarked on a crazy mission of insurance fraud after he fell in love with a married woman. Thinking that he could get away with it because he knows all the tricks in the book he devised a special plan for an insurance scam. Blinded by love he implicated himself in many ways to make the plan work. And he also became quite greedy as he aimed for the “double indemnity clause” to extract the most money possible. But in the end it all came to shambles as he realized that Mr. Keyes was far more clever (and perceptive) than he initially assumed. It didn’t help much that his accomplice wasn’t quite the person that he thought she was. As the movie progresses towards the finale his relationship with Phyllis is starting to corrode.
What I found interesting was the way in which the movie was shot. The movie starts out with Walter rushing into Mr. Keyes office to record a voice memo. He seemed visibly distraught and appeared to be bleeding out of a gunshot wound in his left shoulder. This hasty beginning automatically arouses the interest of the viewer. What happened?; we find ourselves asking. And as Walter begins to record the voice memo we get to see the story as he recollects it. Throughout the movie he’s narrating his own actions by means of that voice memo and as the story ends we finally arrive at the present moment; the story comes full circle so to speak. Storytelling-wise that’s really clever.
I also really enjoyed the dialogues in the first half of the movie. They were very witty and had character. Style-wise the movie is a “Film Noir” movie.
Final verdict: highly recommended (it’s a timeless classic)
IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0036775/
Ontology: #movie #review #filmnoir #crime #drama #noir #classic #40s #1944 #insurance #scam #fraud #BillyWilder #salesman
