Double Indemnity (Billy Wilder, 1944): U.S.A.
Reviewed by Larry Gleeson during the annual TCM 31 Days of Oscar
Double Indemnity, possibly the definite film that firmly establishes the tenants of film noir with its dark visuals and dark narrative with an unflinching pitch-black worldview reminiscent of German Expressionism. Walter Neff (Fred MacMurray), a successful insurance salesman crosses path with femme fatale, Phyllis Dietrichson (Barbara Stanwyck). Neff isn’t a bad sort of a person. Just a bit naive and unsuspecting. Unfortunately, he finds himself at the whims of the strikingly gorgeous, Phyllis who wants her husband dead. Phyllis entices Neff with just a towel and a pair of gams. What unfolds is a blueprint for as close to a perfect film noir as there is.
Film noir typically uses a voice-over narration, flashbacks, low-key lighting, shadows that conceal emotion, rain-slicked pavements representing fragmented psyches – all wrapped around a criminal act with a woman who leads an unsuspecting man down the prim rose path. Double Indemnity has all of this and more boasting an excellent cast headlined by Stanwyck, MacMurray, and Edward G. Robinson, and one of the most talented and enigmatic comedic writer/directors
Ninotchka (Ernst Lubitsch, 1939): U.S.A.
Reviewed by Larry Gleeson during the annual TCM 31 Days of Oscar (2025)
Ninotchka, is a black and white, 1939 American, romantic comedy film made for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer by producer and director Ernst Lubitsch (The Shop Around the Corner) and starring Greta Garbo (Camille, Grand Hotel) and Melvyn Douglas. Billy Wilder was one of the writers along with Charles Brackett and Walter Reisch. One of the film’s best lines came in the form of a question and answer. When Ninotchka was asked how things were in Russia, her response was, “Very Good. The last mass trials were a great success. There are going to be fewer but better Russians.” Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?
The film featured a rare comedic performance by Garbo. It was also the first time I have seen Garbo onscreen. Poster’s advertising the film read “Garbo Laughs.” Garbo received an Oscar nomination for Best Actress for her depiction of the lead character, “Envoy Extraordinary” Nina Ivanovna Yakushov, known simply as Ninotchka.
The film has special relevance as it was the first film to depict a stolid and rigid Stalinist Russia in juxtaposition to the free and