A new kind of film emerged from Hollywood in the early 1940s,
thrillers that derived their plots from the hard-boiled school of
crime fiction but with a style all their own. Appearing in 1944,
"Double Indemnity "was a key film in the definition of the genre
that came to be known as film noir. Its script creates two
unforgettable criminal characters: the cynically manipulative
Phyllis Dietrichson (Barbara Stanwyck) and the likeable but amoral
Walter Neff (Fred MacMurray). Billy Wilder's brilliant direction
enmeshes them in chiaroscuro patterns, the bright California sun
throwing shadows of venetian blinds across dusty rooms, shafts of
harsh lamplight cutting through the night. Richard Schickel traces
in fascinating detail the genesis of the film: its literary origins
in the crime fiction of the 1930s, the difficult relations between
Wilder and his scriptwriter Raymond Chandler, the casting of a
reluctant Fred MacMurray, the late decision to cut from the film
the expensively shot final sequence of Neff's execution. This
elegantly written account, copiously illustrated, confirms a new
the status of "Double Indemnity" as an undisputed classic.
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