Double Indemnity (1944)

Directed by Billy Wilder
Written by Billy Wilder and Raymond Chandler, from a novel by James M. Cain

Femme Fatale (2002)

Written and directed by Brian De Palma

The stark monochrome. The Germanic shadows. The fatal ironies, the ironic fatalism. The sun-shattered Los Angeles and its inky nights. The libidinal allure of death, the existentially terrifying sex. The obsessive investigator. The lust-hammered sap willing to risk all for money or a woman or both. The ice-veined femme fatale in need of a murderous fool. More than any other, Double Indemnity is the film that most obsessively, efficiently, and thrillingly gathered together the tropes of a nascent genre and shotgunned them at the movie screens of the 1940s. No other picture so ably managed to articulate the potential of noir than this wickedly funny (and just plain wicked) tale that plays out as smirking, sensuous flashbacks during a gunshot man’s final moments when death envelops him in its permanent seduction.

The neo-(also erotic-, anti- and deconstructive-)noir Femme Fatale renders subtext as text in its opening shot: Double Indemnity playing on a TV, with its lone viewer’s body—a naked Hitchcock blonde thief (Rebecca Romijn)—reflected across the screen like a full-colored ribbon. That ribbon also thematically binds the film to works like David Lynch’s then-just-released Mulholland Drive, as De Palma crafts a maniacal cinematic essay on everything from noir to neo-noir, crime pictures to the cinema of the surreal, the nature of fantasy to the nature of identity. Above all else, as the movie’s failed Cannes Film Festival heist sequence sends Romijn’s mysterious thief into an (unreal?) double life, De Palma uses the visual language of Hitchcock, the dream language of Lynch and the thematic language of noir to finally take us into the minds of the troubled women who’ve always been lurking at the heart of this genre. This is the movie they have always been watching—and living within.

After a plot description, Cinema Tweets continues:

Some of you may have come across my recent review of Kathryn Bigelow’s recent release A House of Dynamite, a film I criticized for misusing the “vantage point” mechanism as a means of telling its story. Snake Eyes succeeds where A House of Dynamite fails. With Snake Eyes, throughout the second act, we go back in time and revisit the terrorist attack as it unfolds, but from a different character’s vantage point- usually as Detective Santoro interviews a new character. The difference between Bigelow’s film and De Palma’s film is we actually learn something new with each vantage point. There’s more mustard added to the story with each character’s version of events. That’s why the way in which this story is told actually works super well.

But in addition to the vantage point storytelling, we get vintage De Palma artistry. Draped & drenched in split diopters, extreme close-ups, and an unbelievable long, over-head tracking shot throughout the corridors of a hotel. The camera work here is just spectacular. Had you just played this film for me without ever telling me the name of the director, I would’ve known within minutes that this was made by Brian De Palma. His fingerprints are all over this - and I mean that in the best way possible.

Mixed in with a good story & awesome direction from De Palma is a sneaky-excellent Nicolas Cage performance. Cage has always been bombastic & over-the-top in a sort of take it or leave it manner. In this case, I’m definitely taking it because Cage fits the sleazy detective bill perfectly. Part of what I enjoy about Cage’s performance here is that his character Detective Santoro is put on his heels about halfway through the film & never totally regains traction. It brings out a different side of Cage, who appears to be in control throughout the first act of this film. I very much enjoyed the Cage- De Palma partnership.

We don’t get films like Snake Eyes anymore & it’s a damn shame.

MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE—Story and Spectacle celebrates the phenomenon of Paramount Pictures’ thrilling MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE franchise. The exhibition will spotlight star and producer Tom Cruise’s exceptional commitment to practical stunt work, and explore how the series combines technical ingenuity, personal discipline, and artistic commitment, all in service of storytelling, character development, and performance. Sections of the exhibition will be devoted to each film in the series, with a focus on that film’s key stunt or action sequence, along with unique behind-the-scenes content that offers insight on how the remarkable stunts were prepared for and filmed, complemented by related production artifacts.

Access to MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE—Story and Spectacle is included with general Museum admission tickets during its run.

MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE—Story and Spectacle and related programs to be announced are supported by a Market New York grant from Empire State Development and I LOVE NY, New York State’s Division of Tourism.

Aside from the giallo influences, I also connected with the De Palma references. The film features a high-gloss aesthetic reminiscent of features like Body Double and Femme Fatale. It’s also steeped in shadowy noir camerawork by Ali Asad. The cinematographer creates a seductive look and feel that’s fitting to the steamy narrative it accompanies. I initially lamented that we don’t see any split-screen shots to further amplify the callbacks to De Palma’s heyday, but that might have read as too on the nose, considering that the De Palma homages don’t stop there.

The far-fetched twist is plenty reminiscent of the ultimate reveals in films like Raising Cain, Body Double, and Dressed to Kill. It’s worth mentioning that De Palma was heavily inspired by giallo films, and Marshall takes many of his cues from De Palma, so the inspiration here runs several layers deep.

On the whole, the De Palma references paired with the style-over-substance approach so common to giallo filmmaking make this erotic thriller uniquely appealing to me. With that said, it’s not nearly as good as the films that inspired it. In fact, Compulsion is pretty rough. However, it’s ultimately entertaining, visually striking, and invokes nostalgia for the iconic careers of two of my favorite directors. If that sounds like your cup of tea, you may want to check out Compulsion. The film is now available on demand and in select cinemas.