Okay so Double Indemnity totally reminded me of those movies that are coming out lately, based on gothic novels. Movies such as Sin City or The Spirit. They have that scratchy voiced narration and their plot surrounds a morally questionable act or series of acts. They are all in black and white and there is a lot of bad weather, and they are all based in cities.
When I heard the term "film noir" in class today, I didn't know what it meant. But once the film started, I immediately knew the genre and Dick Tracey came to mind.
There is the beautiful, seemingly respectable young woman, Phyllis, who turns out to want her husband dead. At first, I sympathized with Phyllis. Her husband was quite the dud and he obviously was not very nice to her. I also noticed the chemistry and attraction between Phyllis and Walter immediately. Okay, Walter and Phyllis had some of the lamest conversations ever, but I still wanted them to get together right away.
Once Lola tells the story about her mother dying pretty mysteriously, I started to lose some sympathy for Phyllis. Did she kill the first Mrs. Dietrichson so that she could marry Mr. Dietrichson for his money? And then when he lost his money in the oil business and removed her as an heir to his estate, did she then want him dead? Now she seems pretty darn conniving. And did she seduce poor, horny Walter into killing her husband?
And, as a side note, when I was typing the name DIEtRICHson, I wondered if the name has some significance in the film? Just a thought.
Anyway, the femme fatale role has always intrigued me. These women are always just like Eve, talking the innocent, well-meaning men into evil acts. The feminist in me tends to get irritated and indignant when I see these women. Why does it have to be the woman who is the seductress, the mastermind of the crime? Granted, there are some evil women out there, who use their feminine wiles to get what they want. But they also seem to be pretty abundant in this genre of films. Does this reflect how society viewed women at that time?
Even many of the titles make it obvious that the plots revolve around a woman. In Studlar's writing, movies such as Murder, My Sweet, Laura, Phantom Lady and Woman in the Window are listed.
(Another side-comment about Studlar's piece: he totally gets the last names of Phyllis and Walter wrong.)
One thing I liked about the film was the obvious sexual tension. In many earlier films, the relationships between men and women were proper and mostly devoid of physical romance. In Double Indemnity, Walter kept calling Phyllis "baby" (almost too much) and they certainly made out a lot. I guess it was just refreshing to see some relatively realistic interaction between a man and a woman.
Whoa whoa whoa. I am not an expert on the Bible but I'm pretty sure that the serpent who talked Eve into sinning, was male. So in all fairness, Adam wasn't the victim while Eve was Satan's wife.
ReplyDeleteThe article talked a lot about independent women being in sexless, loveless marriages but people tend to forget sex is for reproduction. And as for love, psh, who needs that. Phyllis was off her rocker.
In scriptwriting they always tell us to give our characters names that mean something. So much is in a name and it can tell us so much about a person's character, that it would be foolish to randomly name our characters. I'm not too sure if there is a lot of significance but it is an interesting discovery and very well could have something behind it.
ReplyDeleteThe sexual tension in the film, to me, was hilarious. We talk a lot about the Hays code and how although films during this time were restricted, they often had very clear suggestive undertones. Double Indemnity is the perfect example of this. Probably my favorite line is where Walter shows his concern for Phyllis' lack of coverage. Like I said, I found it so funny and entertaining.
Didn't even think about the societal connectoins in how Phyllis was portrayed. This very well could be possible but I still like to think of it as just being a classic recognizable character that makes the film all the more twisted and entertaining.
Studlar didn't get the names wrong. He was talking about the book that the movie was based on.
ReplyDeleteThe femme fatale is an amazingly potent myth in western culture, isn't it? I agree--very annoying from a feminist perspective, because it's such a limited view of female power and sexuality. But it's the power itself that keeps me interested--its almost like some larger-than-life force which, in a world like Walter Neff's, where life is so reduced and constrained, couldn't help but fascinate.