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The Asphalt Jungle
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Wikipedia article
'The Asphalt Jungle' is a 1950 American film noir heist film directed by John Huston. Based on the 1949 novel of the same name by W. R. Burnett, it tells the story of a jewel robbery in a Midwestern city. The film stars Sterling Hayden, Louis Calhern and Jean Hagen, and features James Whitmore, Sam Jaffe, and John McIntire. Marilyn Monroe also appears, in one of her earliest roles.
The film was nominated for four Academy Awards. In 2008, 'The Asphalt Jungle' was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
Plot
When criminal mastermind Erwin "Doc" Riedenschneider is released from prison after seven years, he visits a bookie named Cobby in an unnamed Midwestern river city. Cobby arranges a meeting between Doc and Alonzo Emmerich, a wealthy lawyer. Doc tells Emmerich of his plan to steal jewelry worth half a million dollars or more. Doc needs $50,000 to hire three mena safecracker, a driver, and a hooliganto pull off the caper. Emmerich agrees to provide the money and find a fence.
Doc hires Louie Ciavelli, a professional safecracker. Ciavelli only trusts Gus Minissi, a hunchbacked diner owner, to be the getaway driver. The last member of the gang is hooligan Dix Handley, also a friend of Gus. Dix tells Doll Conovanwho is in love with himof his dream to buy back the horse farm that his family lost after a terrible year that included his father's death and a prized colt breaking its leg.
To access the jewelry store, Ciavelli hammers through a brick wall, deactivates a door alarm to admit Doc and Dix, and opens the main safe using home-brewed nitroglycerine. Things begin to go drastically wrong. The concussion of the explosion triggers several alarms in the area. Dix slugs a security guard on rounds. The guard drops his revolver, which discharges and wounds Ciavelli in the belly. The men get away unseen, but a police manhunt begins.
Ciavelli insists that Gus take him home. Gus's wife wants to take him to the hospital, but Gus sends for a trusted doctor. Dix and Doc take the loot to Emmerich, who is broke. He sent private detective Bob Brannom to collect sums owed to him, but Brannom failed. Desperate, Emmerich tries to double-cross the others with Brannom's help, suggesting that they leave the gems with him. Realizing that Doc and Dix have seen through Emmerich's stalling, Brannom draws a gun. Dix kills him but is wounded by a through-and-through shot. Doc scolds a suicidal Emmerich for his foolish plan and tells him to offer the jeweler's insurance company the return of the valuables for 25% of their value.
Emmerich dumps Brannom's body in the river. The police find the list of debtors on Emmerich's letterhead on the corpse. When they question him, Emmerich lies about his whereabouts and claims he spent the night with his mistress, Angela Phinlay.
Under pressure from police commissioner Hardy, police lieutenant Ditrichwho is on Cobby's payrollbeats the bookie into confessing everything in a vain attempt to save himself. Ditrich is later arrested for corruption.
With Cobby's confession, Hardy arrests Emmerich at Angela's home and pressures Angela to tell the truth about his whereabouts the night of the crime. When the police allow Emmerich to leave the room to phone his invalid wife, he commits suicide.
After Gus is arrested, he attacks Cobby in the jail, warning him that he will end up in the morgue. When the police knock on Ciavelli's door, they find his funeral in progress.
In Doll's apartment, Doc offers Dix some of the stones but he refuses; he just wants to leave town. After Doc says goodbye to Dix, Doll gets a car and insists on going with Dix.
Doc persuades a taxi driver to drive him a long distance to Cleveland. They stop at a roadside diner, where Doc lusts after a pretty young woman dancing to jukebox tunes and is entranced. Because of the delay, Doc is recognized by two policemen, who arrest him after finding the stolen jewels hidden in his overcoat.
In the car, at a railroad crossing, Dix passes out. A railroad employee takes them to a doctor, who phones the local police to report the gunshot wound. Dix regains consciousness, pulls out the plasma IV and escapes. The doctor observes that he "doesn't have enough blood in him to keep a chicken alive."
At a press conference, Hardy notes that 3 of the 7 suspects have died, 3 others have been arrested, and the one on the loose is a hardened killer "without human feeling."
Dix drives Doll through the fields of Kentucky, deliriously rambling about the black colt he loved as a boy. He arrives at his family's former farm, stumbles into the pasture, and collapses. Doll runs for help, while horses gather to nuzzle the dead man.
Cast
* Sterling Hayden as Dix Handley
* Louis Calhern as Alonzo D. Emmerich
* Jean Hagen as "Doll" Conovan
* James Whitmore as Gus Minissi
* Sam Jaffe as "Doc" Erwin Riedenschneider
* John McIntire as Police Commissioner Hardy
* Marc Lawrence as Cobby
* Barry Kelley as Lt. Ditrich
* Anthony Caruso as Louis Ciavelli
* Teresa Celli as Maria Ciavelli
* Marilyn Monroe as Angela Phinlay
* William "Wee Willie" Davis as Timmons
* Dorothy Tree as May Emmerich
* Brad Dexter as Bob Brannom
* John Maxwell as Dr. Swanson
'Uncredited:'
* Alex Gerry as Maxwell
* Tom Browne Henry as James X. Connery
* Don Haggerty as detective Andrews
* James Seay as detective Janocek
* Henry Rowland as Franz Schurz, German taxi driver
* Strother Martin as 22-year-old in police lineup
* Helene Stanley as Jeannie
* Henry Corden as man in police lineup
* 'Source:'
Production
The film was an adaptation by director John Huston and screenwriter Ben Maddow of the 1949 novel by W. R. Burnett. It was backed by the major film studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, where it was green-lighted by production chief Dore Schary, over the objections of studio head Louis B. Mayer. From the publication of Burnett's first novel, 'Little Caesar' in 1929, Burnett had a strong track record of books that were adapted into films shortly after publication. Huston and Ben Maddow wrote the adaptation, which emphasized the crooks' story and reduced the police procedural aspect.Muller Eddie (June 2, 2019) Intro to the Turner Classic Movies 'Noir Alley' presentation of the film Burnett was consulted as the shooting script was being written, and he approved the final version. The studio allowed the production a relatively free hand.
Production on 'The Asphalt Jungle' took place from October 21, 1949, to late December of that year. Location shooting took place in Lexington and Keeneland, Kentucky and in Cincinnati, Ohio.
In shooting the film, Huston was influenced by European neorealist films such as 'Open City' (1945) and 'Bicycle Thieves' (1948). He combined the naturalism of that genre with the stylized look of 'film noir' and Hollywood crime films. When the film was complete, Louis B. Mayer said: "It's trash. That Asphalt Pavement thing is full of nasty, ugly people doing nasty things. I wouldn't cross the street to see a picture like that."
The Production Code Administration's main concerns with the script were the detailed depiction of the heist and the fact that the character of the corrupt lawyer Emmerich seemed to cheat justice by killing himself. Neither the studio nor the censors interfered significantly with the script, however, and both the heist and the suicide featured in the final cut. The suicide scene was re-written: the original scene had Emmerich finishing a suicide note, while the revised scene has him not being able to write the note and being extremely agitated about the decision to kill himself.
Huston's first choice for the role played by Marilyn Monroe was Lola Albright, who was not available. Huston brought in Monroe for a screen test, and rehearsed for it with her in his office. He wasn't convinced that she was right for the part, and dismissed her, but changed his mind when he watched her leave the room. According to 'film noir' authority Eddie Muller, Huston later said that Monroe was "one of the few actresses who could make an entrance by leaving the room." The role was a breakout for Monroe.
Both Huston and star Sterling Hayden, a war hero, were members of the Committee for the First Amendment, which opposed the blacklisting of alleged communists active in the film industry during the Red Scare.
Reception
Box office
According to MGM records the film made $1,077,000 in the US and Canada and $1,060,000 overseas resulting in a profit of only $40,000.Critical response
On the review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 97% based on 35 reviews, with an average rating of 8.4/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "'The Asphalt Jungle' is an expertly told crime story with attention paid to the crime and characters in equal measure."The Criterion Collection critic Peter Heath Becker admired Huston's technique:
A review in 'Photoplay' stated:
'The New York Times' said of the film:
Awards and honors
Legacy
'The Asphalt Jungle' was one of the most influential crime films of the 1950s. According to the AFI Film Catalog, "is widely regarded by film critics as one of John Huston's best."
The film spawned a television series, 'The Asphalt Jungle', starring Jack Warden, Arch Johnson, and William Smith, billed as "Bill Smith", which ran for thirteen episodes in the spring and summer of 1961 on ABC. The series, though, resembled the film in name only, except for one episode, "The Professor", which was constructed as a sequel to the feature. Aside from this one-shot, however, none of the characters in the film appeared in the television scripts, and the plots were devoted to the exploits of the major case squad of the New York Police Department. One of the most notable features of the series is the theme song, written by Duke Ellington.
Burnett's novel 'The Asphalt Jungle' was the basis of M-G-M's western film 'The Badlanders' (1958) directed by Delmer Daves, as well as 'Cairo' starring George Sanders, followed by the blaxploitation film 'Cool Breeze' (1972), directed by Barry Pollack.
'The Asphalt Jungle' instigated the crime thriller subgenre of caper films. The 1955 French film 'Rififi', which critics such as Leonard Maltin have labeled as the best heist film ever, drew much inspiration from 'The Asphalt Jungle'.
In 2008, 'The Asphalt Jungle' was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
Colorization dispute
The movie was the subject of a film colorization lawsuit and controversy in France. Turner Entertainment entered into an agreement with the French television channel, La Cinq, to broadcast the colorized movie. John Huston's heirs objected, filing a lawsuit against broadcasting this version. On November 23, 1988, 'The Asphalt Jungle' was prohibited from being broadcast in France. On July 6, 1989, La Cinq won on appeal, broadcasting the film on August 6, 1989, the day after the anniversary of the death of Marilyn Monroe. Finally in 'Turner Entertainment Co. v. Huston,' on May 28, 1991, the Court of Cassation cancelled the judgment delivered on July 6, 1989, stating that colorizing the movie transformed the original artwork enough to potentially transgress the author's moral rights. Huston's heirs had sought to block the broadcast of the colorized version.
References
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