Zero Draft Questions Double Indemnity

Double Indemnity

Question 1:

In Double Indemnity the movie you see a completely different ending then you get in the novel. Now the question is whether which ending is more appropriate for film noir, and the differences between them. The ending in the book is more of a boring ending in my opinion and not appropriate for film noir, Walter and Phyllis are both let go by Keyes. Walter confesses to Keyes about killing Mr. Nitlinger and him and Phyllis end up on a ship where they both do not know where they are going. Although they both know that they are eventually going to get caught by somebody and that they both have nothing in their lives, so what they do is give up there own lifes and plan to drop off the ship when the moon comes up. While in the movie you see a very different ending, instead of Mr. Keyes letting Phyllis and Walter go they both serve up there own justice. Near the end of the film you see Phyllis and Walter in the Nitlinger home and little does Walter know but she has a gun under the chair she is sitting and is planning to kill him. In this scene you definitely see a lot of film noir effects, when Walter enters the scene through the door he has a very dark big shadow behind him showing his dark side. Another thing you can notice is the venetian blinds, they really nail film noir. In the scene you see Walter talking to Phyllis about whats going on, then when Walter closes the window that's when Phyllis shoots him once. He is still alive after being shot, he think walks over to Phyllis and then grabs the gun from her and shoots her twice. Although Huff was shot also, I definitely think that Phyllis got what she deserves in the movie. When she got shot she got what she deserved because of all the things she did to the other people.  The ending in the film definitely fit in more with film noir than the novel. The ending in the film fits into the dark, shadowy, weird, and cruel aspects of the noir genre, definitely more than the novel does.

Question 5:

In the first scene with the opening credits you see a man walking towards the screen hobbling on crutches, I think that the character represented is definitely Walter Huff impersonating Mr. Nitlinger. The significance of the image is to show what or who it might be later on. It makes you think of what character that person is going to be, and that's definitely what makes it appropriate for the beginning of the film, it's very different and weird and definitely makes you think of what is going to happen during the movie. It makes you think of why that character is on crutches and walking in the dark, and its very shadowy so you can not see who's face it is. Later on in the film you begin to hear what makes you know who the person hobbling on crutches is going to be. When Walter Huff kills Mr. Nitlinger he then has to impersonate him because he had broken his leg working and it would play well with the witness statements if anybody had saw him. It ends up working for the impersonation and the whole beginning scene begins to make you realize what character it was in the beginning. The character definitely is Walter Huff and it makes a very good beginning to a very good film noir movie.