For people who are not familiar with the brilliant comedic work of Peter Sellers, those of us who are familiar with it might suggest that they acquaint themselves with his work in such iconic films as Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (which garnered him his first of 2 Oscar nominations) or any of his performances as the bumbling Inspector Clouseau in his Pink Panther films or even his performance as the inimitable Dr. Ftitz Fassbender in What’s New Pussycat. Those are all fine performances and certainly worthy of your time. However, it was Sellers’ penultimate role as Chance the gardener in Hal Ashbey’s sublime Being There, which might be the best performance he ever gave, and garnered him his second Best Actor nomination. This is a film that is subtle in its brilliance, and make no mistake, it is brilliant. It does take a little bit of time to get going, but it is spending that time reeling the audience in. That’s a bit symbolic of the fact that Sellers tried unsuccessfully for nearly nine years to get the film made, and it was only after his success in the Pink Panther films that his career had been revived enough after a series of flops to get him enough clout to get the film produced. This was a labor of love not only for Sellers, but for many people involved in the making of the picture. This is an understated film with many understated moments that lead to big laughs and deep thoughts.

Why it’s essential.

I mentioned above that this is a brilliant film. Brilliant is a word that gets bandied about quite a bit, and can be used very subjectively, especially when it comes to talking about films. I believe that Being There is a brilliant film because it requires thought. You have to be able to think about this film as you’re watching it. Also, this film is loaded to the gills with social commentary, and even though it came out in 1979, it’s totally relevant to today’s political, racial and economic climates. As you will see by watching this film, the more that things have changed, the more they have stayed the same.

Not only is it a thoughtful film, but it’s also a very emotional film at the same time. This film deals with primal needs like love and compassion while also confronting us with the needs of the greedy and the powerful. When Chance is accidentally (by chance?) thrown into the world of the economic and political elite, it is his humanity and apparent compassion that draw the individuals to him. What they love about Chance is his humanity, and they misinterpret his simple points of view as a dynamic world view around which governmental economic policy should be based. The second half of the film is a hilarious comedy of errors as we watch everyone from the CIA and the FBI to the press and even foreign governments try to discover who he really is without ever questioning the advice he’s giving. And what’s so brilliant about it is that he isn’t even giving advice.

All Chance knows about is gardening. He spent his entire life working in the garden of an old man and was never allowed to set foot off the property. In every way, his mental capacity is that of a seven or eight year old boy. Some fifteen years later, Tom Hanks would do something similar with the character of Forrest Gump, and Chance was a total precursor to that character. Since all Chance can really speak of with any amount of knowledge is gardening, whenever anyone asks him any kind of important question, he always brings the conversation back to gardening and how you might handle a garden depending on the season of the year. All of these powerful people, right up to the president of the United States (Jack Warden) misunderstand him and believe that he’s speaking in metaphors. To these people, Chance, or Chauncey Gardner as they know him, is a brilliant man who isn’t afraid to speak his mind and tell people hard things.

Similarly to Network, which had come out the year before, and many other films of the 1970’s, Being There takes a very critical look at the television medium, and specifically television news. Director Hal Ashby and screenwriter Jerzi Kosinski (he based the screenplay on his own novel), showed a society that was already starting to have its individuals become preoccupied with the box. Watching Chance ignore Eve (Shirley MacLaine) as she throws herself at him so that he can watch whatever mundane show is on the television is not unlike standing in a line or riding on a train or being in almost any public space today as people largely ignore the world that’s around them to focus on whatever device they have in their hand at that moment. There are also moments in Being There when people representing television get an overinflated sense of self depending on how Chance answers their questions. For instance, after Chance appears on a television show to talk about the economic advice he gave to the president, several journalists ask him if he’d read the commentary about it in the newspapers. Chance never learned how to read, but only tells the reporters that he didn’t read the papers and only watches television. Since everyone thinks this man is so brilliant, a television news reporter proudly states in to her camera that Chauncey Gardner only gets his news from the television.

Ultimately what is so great about this film is the misdirection, and the fact that the audience is in on it. We get to watch these supposed elites bumble and trip over themselves trying to meet and get sage advice from someone that we know is a fool. For me, that’s what puts this film ahead of a film like Forrest Gump. In the latter film, the other characters are in on the joke, and Forrest succeeds in spite of that due to being in the right place at the right time (the fishing boat during the storm) or miraculously having the right skill (running fast, ping pong). He even ultimately gets Jenny back in his life. Being There is different. We as the audience are allowed to know that Chance is a fool, but the characters in the story are not. Many of them can see that something as awry, but no one can place their finger on what’s wrong with the exception of one character. It’s the other characters in the film who unwittingly hoist success on Chance. As a main character, he has no character arc. He doesn’t grow or change at all. However, the gentleness of his spirit softens the hardened souls around him and brings out humanity where there previously had been none. In this story the hero brings about change in others.

The perfect example of that is Dr. Robert Allenby (Richard Dysart). After Chance is kicked out of the deceased man’s house, he aimlessly wanders the streets of Washington, D.C. After seeing himself on a television display in a store, he steps off the sidewalk to get a better look at himself, but gets caught between two cars. The chauffeur comes out to see if he’s ok, and the passenger in the car, Eve Rand, insists that they take Chance to her home. Her husband, Benjamin Rand (Melvyn Douglas in an Oscar-winning performance) has been ill for some time and there is a doctor there who can see to his leg. Chance agrees, and gets in the car. Eve gives him a drink, but having never tasted alcohol before, Chance starts coughing as she asks his name. He’s trying to say Chance the gardener, but she hears Chauncey Gardner, and that’s what he’s known by for the rest of the film.

That is until Dr. Allenby figures out who he is. Allenby doesn’t trust Chance. He wants to know who he is, and through conversations with Chance, he gets the name of the lawyer who kicked him out of the old man’s house. Over the course of the story, it is only Allenby who discovers that Chance is really a nobody. And yet, everyone else has become quite fond of him. Eve has actually fallen in love with him, and Benjamin considers him a friend and a confidant. The thing to know about Ben is that when we meet him, he’s 100% capitalist. He’s a small-government/big business Republican who is out for himself and no one else. Near the end of the film, as he lies dying in bed, Allenby comes in to tell him the truth about Chance. Before he can, Benjamin tells Allenby that there’s something about Chauncey that he trusts. He makes him feel good, and that since Chauncey has been around the thought of dying has been much easier. It goes unspoken that Chauncey’s presence has brought Benjamin peace, and Dr Allenby says nothing to disturb it. It’s as beautiful an emotional moment that I’ve ever seen in a film. After Benjamin passes, Allenby refers to Chance by his real name, acknowledging that he knows, but he now appreciates the humanity that he’s brought into their world.

I would also be remiss if I didn’t mention the acting in this film. I did mention above that Peter Sellers was nominated for Best Actor, and only Dustin Hoffman giving one of his signature performances for Kramer Vs. Kramer prevented him from winning it. I used the word understated before, and that’s what Sellers acting is in this. If you watch the other films that I mentioned earlier that Sellers starred in, as well as most all of his other films, you’ll see an actor who is quite often over the top. He is loud and boisterous and will do almost anything for a laugh. His performances of Inspector Clouseau and the title character in Dr. Strangelove are perfect examples of that. However, as Chance, Sellers gave us a performance in which most of the laughs came from subtle lines and subtle actions. There are a few over the top moments, such as the scene in which he does yoga on the bed as Eve masturbates, but even that scene is comparatively reigned in. Again, this is a movie you need to think about, and the best laughs in the film are thoughtful moments where the audience has to connect the dots in order to get the joke. Sellers understated performance is the crown jewel of this very thoughtful film.

Finally, there is the last shot in the film. I’m not going to say what it is, but it might be one of the most interpretive shots to ever end any film. It’s the type of shot that sparks discussion because it can be interpreted in as many ways as there are people who watch it.

This is a film that came out in the late 1970’s, a very pessimistic time in our country’s history. In many ways this film reflects that pessimism, but also adds a hint of whimsy. As pall bearers of Ben’s coffin plan to nominate Chance as the next president, we’re given a fairly fatalistic view of the power structure of the country, and a pessimistic view of the possibility of any real solutions. But then we see Chance, mending a pine tree sapling. We see Chance showing the humanity that he brought to this world, and then we see him do something impossible. I like to think that he’s showing us that no problem is so great that we can’t overcome it simply by treating each other like human beings, with kindness and respect and nurturing. That message in an of itself makes this film essential viewing.

This truly is a wonderful film that I can’t recommend highly enough. It is the prototypical Film noir, and many film historians rate it among the greatest of all Film noir. For storytelling and screenwriting aficionados this is an expertly crafted story, the development of which shows that the best stories in film are told in four acts rather than three. Double Indemnity has perhaps the greatest of all femme fatales in Phyllis Dietrichson, played brilliantly in an Oscar-nominated performance by Barbara Stanwyck. Fred MacMurray played one of his signature roles as the doomed insurance salesman Walter Neff, and Edward G. Robinson added to the pantheon of his great roles by playing the tenacious claims adjuster Barton Keyes. This is a story about an almost-perfect murder and is filled with drama so that you find yourself actually rooting for the murderers to get away with it. However, watching the plan unravel is incredibly entertaining, and the creation of the story is textbook storytelling and screenwriting. Double Indemnity is a film buff’s film that anyone can appreciate.

Why it’s essential

As great as the performances of the actors are in this, the screenplay for Double Indemnity would certainly rank in my personal top ten screenplays of all time. It’s as close to a perfect screenplay as I think you can get with a solid structure, a perfect Hero’s Journey, and enough symbolism and subtext to fill two films. Director Billy Wilder, who co-wrote the screenplay with Raymond Chandler developed a story where just enough is revealed to us at just the right moments. We find out what’s really happening as Walter does. We watch as Walter puts the pieces together and we root for him as he tries in vain to save himself. An interesting motif that they used in this film, and one that Wilder would use to similar effect a few years later in Sunset Boulevard was to give away the ending right at the beginning of the story. A haggard-looking Walter walks into the building of the insurance company he works for and makes his way to an office. He starts talking into a recording device and mentions he’s talking to Keyes and that this might be a confession. He guesses that Keyes is probably wondering why he did it. “I killed him for money, for a woman. I didn’t get the money, and I didn’t get the woman.” We’re less then seven minutes into the film when he says that, and then the rest of the film is told in flashback with Walter narrating. The point is that we know right from the beginning that he doesn’t get away with it. We know right from the beginning that the hero is not going to win and yet we’re still compelled to watch it all happen, because the story ends up not being about pulling off the plan but how it unraveled.

I think the reason that we’re compelled to continue watching is that Wilder and Chandler did a superb job of building the drama and the relationships in the story that prohibited us from looking away. Not only is the relationship between Walter and Phyllis dripping with unmentioned sexual tension, but the relationship between Walter and Keyes goes way beyond the typical mentor/protege relationship. It really is almost a paternal bond between the two of them. There are even a couple of times after Keyes has gone on a rant where Walter quips, “I love you, too.” Perhaps the most heartbreaking moment comes at the very end of the film when Walter tells Keyes that he couldn’t see what was going on because Walter was too close to him, right across the desk, as matter of fact, to which Keyes replies, “Closer than that, Walter.”

That’s another great thing about this film is that it’s loaded with contradictions. Walter is an anti-hero and the protagonist. And yet, he starts the story out as an honest salesman, pointing out to Phyllis that he never criticizes the merchandise of another company.  Keyes, the only honest man in this whole picture, is the antagonist for most of the film, and the one who mostly stands in the way of Walter getting what he wants. Phyllis, the femme fatale of the picture, starts out as a sympathetic character, but we eventually come to realize that she’s manipulating everyone. The husband that she want’s killed, while not terribly sympathetic, isn’t a bad person at all. We have no reason to root for him to die, other than his death is the locomotion that propels the story forward. The only truly good character is Lola, Deitrichson’s daughter, and her boyfriend, Nino Zachetti, comes off as being a huge jerk until the last moment he’s on screen. The good characters are bad, and the bad ones are good, so that we find ourselves actually rooting for murderers and connivers and against honesty and integrity.

All of this is possible, of course, because of the excellent structure, the foundation if you will, that the story is built upon. It is clearly broken up in to four acts with the adventure beginning and moving from the first act to the second when Walter puts the plan in motion to kill Dietrichson. The stakes are raised half way through the film when Walter goes through with killing Dietrichson. The crisis occurs at between Acts 3 and 4 when Walter finds out from Keyes that Keyes knows it’s murder and that Phyllis had a male accomplice. This structure is hung on the skeleton of a Hero’s Journey that hits all of the right notes. I can’t emphasize enough how the strength of the story’s structure along with the Hero’s Journey contribute to the overall quality of this film. By effectively laying that foundation, Wilder and Chandler opened up opportunities for themselves to create scenes that were loaded with drama, wit, humor, and pathos that engaged and entertained the audience at a level that would have been impossible without that foundation and structure.

Walter’s Ordinary World is that of a door-to-door insurance salesman. He stops at the home of a customer named Dietrichson to check on a renewal. Mr. Dietrichson isn’t home, but his wife Phyllis is. There is some initial flirting, and one of the great subtext conversations of all time (Phyllis: There’s a speed limit in this state, Mr. Neff. Forty-five miles an hour. Walter: How fast was I going, Officer? Phyllis: I’d say about 90.) In the next scene we meet the mentor, Keyes, the claims adjuster for the company Walter works for. We learn right away that he’s very good at his job and can see a scam coming from a mile away. He refers to his “little man” that lives inside his chest and gives him heartburn every time someone tries to get a phony claim by him. Then a couple of scenes later, Phyllis provides Walter with his Call to Adventure by asking for an Accident Insurance policy to be taken out on her husband without him knowing about it. Seeing what Phyllis wants to do, Walter Refuses the Call and leaves the house. Phyllis comes to see him later that night, and the both profess to be crazy about each other. As they sit on the couch, Walter Crosses the First Threshold by coming up with an idea to kill Dietrichson. That’s the end of Act 1.

Act 2A begins with the Tests, Allies and Enemies section of the Hero’s Journey, and in it we see Walter and Phyllis meticulously plan the murder and the cover-up, as well as getting Dietrichson to unknowingly sign the fateful insurance policy with the double indemnity clause that pays double for dying on a train. That’s when Walter tells Phyllis that her husband’s pending trip to Palo Alto needs to be taken on the train. That’s also where we meet Dietrichson for the first time, as well as his daughter Lola and her boyfriend Zachetti. All of these characters will have serious impacts on the rest of the story moving forward. The biggest test occurs when Phyllis informs Walter that her husband broke his leg, so he won’t be going on the trip, and Walter has to press he to make him go. The Approach shows the final preparations that put the plan in motion. Walter takes us step by step through his movements on that fateful night all the way until he gets to the Dietrichsons’ house and hides in the back seat of their car. The Ordeal is the actual murder of Dietrichson at the hands of Walter, in what is one of the most interesting murder scenes ever shot. Due to the constraints of the Production Code, Wilder couldn’t show the actual murder, so instead he focused the camera on Phyllis and her very subtle reaction to the killing. It’s disturbing, and it lets us into Phyllis’ head and gives us a sense of her frame of mind moving forward. The Ordeal continues as Walter takes Dietrichson’s place on the train, and has to jump off at the point where they’ll leave Dietrichson’s body on the tracks. Unfortunately a man named Jackson is sitting on the observation deck, and Walter has to come up with a ruse to get rid of him before he can jump off.

That’s the end of Act 2A. Up to that point the story had been about killing Dietrichson. Well, now Dietrichson is dead, and the focus and the direction of the story shift to getting the insurance money.

Act 2B begins with the Reward, and that section of the script involves the inquiry in which Norton, the president of the insurance company calls Phyllis in and tells her that the company believes that her husband committed suicide, and he offers her a settlement. Pretending to be beside herself with grief, Phyllis berates Norton and storms out. That’s when Keyes appears to save the day for Walter when he further berates Norton by telling him that in all of the actuary tables they have there is no mention of anyone attempting suicide by jumping from a slow moving train, and they’re going to have to pay through the nose. It’s one of the great monologues in cinema, and can be viewed here. That gets Walter feeling good about himself, until The Road Back happens, and Keyes starts to become suspicious when he realizes that Dietrichson never put in an insurance claim in for his broken leg. The more he digs, the more the signs point to Phyllis and the more he realizes that someone else is involved as well, although he doesn’t suspect Walter. What’s worse for Walter is that Lola comes to see him and gives him some information that convinces him that Lola suspects Phyllis killed her father. Walter then tries to convince Phyllis that it’s over and it’s not going to work out, but Phyllis is having none of it. “Straight down the line” she says to him.

That’s the end of Act 2B. The focus of the story at that point shifts from being about getting the insurance money to keep from getting caught.

Act 3 starts out with the Resurrection, and that section in Double Indemnity shows the old Walter become resurrected. The Walter who lived on the right side of the law, the Walter who was an honest salesman. That Walter returns as he tries to make amends. However, he realizes that it’s going to take killing Phyllis and framing Zachetti in order to completely get off the hook. But after Lola says that she still loves Zachetti, it becomes clear to Walter what he has to do. He confronts Phyllis, who shoots him, though not fatally, and something is preventing her from finishing him off. He then shoots her, and he sees Zachetti coming up the drive way. Knowing the police are on the way, he tells Zachetti to go to Lola, because she loves him and can make him happy. Once everything is done, we go back to Walter in the present time, and Keyes has arrived and is listening in. The Return with the Elixir has Walter trying to escape, but he’s too weak from the gun shot. Keyes tells him he’s all washed up, and Walter’s days as a free man are now over.

That’s the story of Double Indemnity in four acts. Not only is the structure of this story close to perfect, but the details with which its told are also spot on. Wilder and Chandler did a great job of giving Walter challenges, and of revealing information to him and to the audience at just the right intervals in order to maximize their dramatic effect. What we’re left with is a film that is more than satisfying. It’s pure entertainment, and it exemplifies what dramatic film making can be. In fact, film makers of all levels, be they writers, directors, or especially development executives, could learn a thing or two about how well this story is crafted and how dramatic it is. This is a timeless story that should be seen by anyone who loves great film making.

*All references to the Hero’s Journey courtesy of The Writer’s Journey by Christopher Vogler.