Double Indemnity

Walter Neff is unmarried, yet he wears a wedding ring throughout the movie.

The door to Neff's apartment opens away from, rather than toward, the apartment.

This was a violation of the Los Angeles Fire Code.

('Billy Wilder' (qv) knew this, but could not change the door because of the crucial scene where Phyllis is hiding behind the door in the hallway.

) In the first scene in which Walter first kisses Phyllis, we see a wedding ring on Walter's hand.

'Fred MacMurray' (qv) was married and the ring was not noticed until post-production.

Although set in 1938, Walter Neff makes reference to the "The Philadelphia Story", which did not debut on Broadway until 1939, and on film until 1940.

After Neff meets with the President of his company, he returns to his apartment and places a folder on the chair to the right of the door.

When Keyes comes to the door, after Neff's brief phone conversation, the folder is nowhere to be seen.

The movie is set in 1938, but at Stanwyck's house the radio is playing "Tangerine" which wasn't written until 1942.

When Phyllis prepares to meet Neff for the last time, the effect of "moonlight" through the blinds appears in the room just before she turns out the lamps.

Early in the film, as Phyllis finds Walter's address in the phone book and goes to his apartment, Neff turns on a three-way lamp by the door using a switch on the wall.

Later in the film, the lamp is gone.

When Keyes approaches to speak to Neff as Neff enters work one morning, Neff asks Keyes if it has to do with the "Peterson" case.

The name of the character in question is "Dietrichson," not "Peterson".

However this could be seen as Neff's try to show no interest to the case.

(NOTE: This review has mild spoilers, it doesn't spoiler everything, but I would possibly recommend watching the film first). I was left completely speechless.

Double Indemnity is quite possibly my favorite film noir, although Strangers on a Train and The Maltese Falcon are both up there. Double Indemnity stars Fred MacMurray as Walter Neff, an insurance salesman who partners up with Phyllis Dietrichson, a wife who wants to murder her husband and make some money while she's at it.

I first became interested in the film noir genre after seeing the 1958 film, "King Creole", starring Elvis Presley, Walter Matthau, Carolyn Jones, Dean Jagger and Delores Hart. It was directed by Michael Curtiz of "Casablanca" fame.

Another of my dad's favourite films and was he ever right. Along with that other celebrated James M Cain adaptation "The Postman Always Rings Twice", this particular cocktail of sex, murder and intrigue becomes the cinematic equivalent of a page-turning thriller as workaday insurance salesman Fred McMurray falls hard for Barbara Stanwyck's anklet and soon afterwards the rest of her so that before he knows it he's ankle-deep in a murderous plot that will have catastrophic consequences for them both.

Film noir is often both mystery and tragedy intertwined as a single genre. It was a one of a kind film experience, one that has remained an undeniable classic for some time.

Billy Wilder was a phenomenal director, at home in genres as wide-ranging as the delightful goofiness of SOME LIKE IT HOT, the twisted courtroom puzzle of Agatha Christie's WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION, and the somewhat darker comedy/drama of films like THE APARTMENT and SUNSET BLVD. In fact, he was so good that picking out a "masterpiece" for this director is a little like trying to choose one Van Gogh.

In the course of his work, an insurance salesman falls for a provocative housewife who wishes her husband were dead. Unknown to the husband, he signs an accident policy which doubles the payout in exceptional cases.

The writing and dialogue had great energy and kept me really invested in the film. And of course with film noir there is the beautiful dramatic lighting which makes it so compelling.

*Possible Spoilers!* Released in 1944 - Double Indemnity's story of vicious betrayal may be somewhat flawed and inconsistent - And, its 3 principal actors may have been miscast (especially Barbara Stanwyck as the deceitfully wicked femme fatale in a really cheap-looking wig) - But, overall, it's quite easy to see why this vintage, Hollywood Crime/Drama is considered to be a true "classic" of 1940s Film Noir.