Director Billy Wilder and Raymond Chandler did a spectacular developing James M. Cain's Double Indemnity into a 1944 movie of the same name. A greedy woman who loves money and an insurance man who is mesmerized by her promises get caught up in a web of murder and intrigue. The wife Phyllis Dietrichson (Stanwyck) is clearly in the driver's seat as she mastermind's the plot to get Walter Neff (MacMurray) to go along with her plan to insure her husband whom she despises, with a double indemnity clause wherein 'death by accident' doubles the amount of the policy. However, once the murder is committed, you watch as the so called fail proof plan falls apart. Stanwyck and MacMurray snip and argue because of mistrust of each other. Edward G. Robinson plays the tireless insurance investigator Barton Keyes who senses that something is not quite right and sets out to prove it.

This is one for your classic movie collection.



Melissa the Movie Maven recommends the DOUBLE INDEMNITY remake:

BODY HEAT with WIlliam Hurt and Kathleen Turner.

Read what Roger Ebert has to say about this 1981 movie.

"Women are rarely allowed to be bold and devious in the movies; most directors are men, and they see women as goals, prizes, enemies, lovers and friends, but rarely as protagonists. Turner's entrance in ``Body Heat'' announces that she is the film's center of power. It is a hot, humid night in Florida. Hurt, playing a cocky but lazy lawyer named Ned Racine, is strolling on a pier where an exhausted band is listlessly playing. He is behind the seated audience. We can see straight down the center aisle to the bandstand. All is dark and red and orange. Suddenly a woman in white stands up, turns around and walks straight toward him. This is Matty Walker. To see her is to need her."

Read Eberts full review of BODY HEAT


Movie Facts and Figures:

Billy Wilder
. Double Indemnity (1944)
. The Lost Weekend (1945)
. Witness For the Prosecution (1957)

Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlow
. The Big Sleep (1939)
. Farewell, My Lovely (1940)'Murder My Sweet' in the US
. The High Window (1942)
. The Lady in the Lake (1943)
. The Little Sister (1949)
. The Long Goodbye (1953)
. Playback (1958)

James M. Cain novels
. The Postman Always Rings Twice (1934)
. Double Indemnity (1936)
. Mildred Pierce (1941)
All were made into movies. All are considered classic noir.