FAQ

Late one night, insurance salesman Walter Neff (Fred MacMurray) stumbles into his office of the Pacific All Risk Insurance Company in order to dictate a memo to claims manager, Barton Keyes (Edward G. Robinson), telling him how he and Phyllis Dietrichson (Barbara Stanwyck), the wife of one of his clients, murdered her husband just days after they tricked him into purchasing a $50,000 accident policy with a double indemnity clause.

Double Indemnity is based on a novella of the same name by American crime novelist James M Cain (1892-1977). The story first appeared as an 8-part serial in Liberty magazine in 1935. The novella was adapted for the movie by another American crime writer Raymond Thornton Chandler (1888-1959) along with director Billy Wilder (1906-2002). A made-for-TV remake, Double Indemnity (1973) was released in 1973.

Apparently so. Novelist James A Cain based his novella on a 1927 crime in which a married Queens woman, Ruth Brown Snyder, persuaded her lover to kill her husband Albert after Albert had just recently taken out a large insurance policy with a double indemnity clause.

Double indemnity is a clause in an insurance policy that provides for double the face amount of the policy should the policyholder die of an accidental death (that is, a death that is neither foreseeable nor intentional on the part of the holder or beneficiary). In the film, this scope is narrowed somewhat as Neff indicates that at his firm only certain accidents qualify for the clause.

1. They choo-choo.

He's using 'strike anywhere' wooden matches, popular in the 1940s. Today's safety matches come with a striking board impregnated with a chemical that the match needs for ignition, so the match can only be lit by use of the striking board. In a 'strike anywhere' match, this chemical was in the white tip, so all you needed was a rough surface to strike it against. If your thumbnail was long enough, you could actually strike a match under it, as did Walter.

As morning approaches, Walter winds up his dictation, asking Keyes to break the news gently to Lola (Jean Heather) and to take care of her and Zachetti (Byron Barr). He turns his head to see Keyes listening in the doorway, having been alerted by the janitor that Walter was bleeding. Expecting a lecture with a lot of 'two dollar words', Walter is surprised when Keyes simply says, 'Walter, you're all washed up.' Keyes picks up the phone to call for a doctor, but Walter stops him, saying that he doesn't want to go through the process of healing only so that he can walk into the gas chamber at San Quentin under his own power. Instead, Walter decides to make a run for the Mexican border. He stumbles out into the main office but only makes it to the doorway before collapsing on the floor. Keyes phones for an ambulance then tends to Walter. Breathing heavily, Walter tells Keyes that the reason he couldn't figure this insurance fraud out was because he was too close...right across the desk. 'Closer than that, Walter,' Keyes admits. 'I love you, too,' Walter replies and reaches into his pocket for a cigarette. Keyes strikes a match to light it for him. Together, they wait for the ambulance.

The original ending to the movie continued after the present ending through Walter's trial and execution. However, the director eventually decided that the additional material was redundant and depressing, so he cut it for the theatrical release. All the film of the additional scenes has been lost or destroyed, leaving only some still photos.

Walter knew that he was 'all washed up' and that he'd been used by Phyllis, despite her last attempt to convince him that she had fallen in love with him. He also felt guilty for duping Keyes, someone for whom he felt a real affection. Consequently, he needed to set things right at the end. He needed to confess so that Zachetti wouldn't be pinned as the murderer, thereby depriving Lola of the man she loved, and he needed to tell Keyes how the murder was accomplished and why he couldn't solve this case, perhaps to make him even better equipped as a claims manager...or perhaps just because he cared about Keyes and wanted him to know the truth.

Phyllis is an iconic femme fatale, and she is unusual in that she doesn't bring about the destruction of a good man—she brings about the destruction of a bad one. But she displays other hallmark femme fatale characteristics, such as a total indifference to the feelings of others. Read more on the character here.