The Reading Life: Happy birthday to me — and Raymond Chandler

Watching the video clip, my heart raced. I'd seen the movie before, of course, but never realized what I was looking at: there, in the background of "Double Indemnity," was Raymond Chandler. His appearance in the movie he'd help script had gone unnoticed for 55 years, until two separate researchers pointed him out in 2009. And there he was in a hallway as Fred MacMurray walked past, cigarette in hand, reading.

By Carolyn Kellogg

July 17, 2011