these films have an allure which they use to gain their ends and which ultimately destroys the men they attract. Walter Neff is the protagonist in Double Indemnity (1944), an insurance salesman who succumbs to the lure of the wife of a client and becomes enmeshed in a murder plot for insurance money. Phyllis Dietrich is used as a sexual lure from the moment she descends the staircase, and the first thing noted about her is the bracelet around her ankle, essentially representing sexual tension, the lure of gold, and an identification of her as belonging to someone else. One of the repeated themes in film noir is obsession--Walter Neff becomes obsessed with Phyllis, just as Phyllis is obsessed with money and leisure and in fact herself. Neff indicates this himself when he says to Phyllis, "I never cared about the money. All I wanted was you." For her part, Phyllis never cared about anything but the money, and she uses Neff in order to get what she wants.
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