The Asphalt Jungle
Template:Short description Template:About Template:Use American English Template:Infobox film The Asphalt Jungle is a 1950 American heist film noir directed by John Huston, from a screenplay co-written with Ben Maddow. It stars Sterling Hayden, Louis Calhern, Jean Hagen, James Whitmore, Sam Jaffe, John McIntire and Marilyn Monroe in one of her earliest roles.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Based on the 1949 novel by W. R. Burnett, it tells the story of a jewel robbery in a Midwestern city.
Produced and distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, the film was released on May 12, 1950. It was nominated for four Academy Awards, including Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay, and Huston won a National Board of Review Award for his direction. At the 1950 Venice Film Festival, Huston was nominated for the Golden Lion and Sam Jaffe won the Best Actor Award.
Retrospective reviews of the film have been highly positive, with several critics describing it as one of the most influential works in the crime film genre,<ref name="nnat" /> and one of Huston's best films.<ref name="afi" /> The film spawned a television series of the same name that aired on ABC in 1961.
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".<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Plot
When criminal mastermind Erwin "Doc" Riedenschneider is released from prison, he visits a bookie named Cobby in an unnamed Midwestern river city. Doc needs $50,000 to hire three men—a safecracker, a driver and a hooligan—to commit a huge jewel robbery. Cobby arranges a meeting between Doc and Alonzo Emmerich, a high-society lawyer and known fixer. Doc tells Emmerich that the theft will yield half a million dollars or more. Emmerich agrees to front the money and find a fence. After they leave, Emmerich finds his young girlfriend Angela asleep on the couch. Private detective Bob Brannom visits Emmerich to collect some debts, but Emmerich is broke and convinces Brannom to help him double-cross the others, proposing a scheme for him to abscond with the gems.
Doc secures Louie Ciavelli as the safecracker. Ciavelli only trusts Gus Minissi, a hunchbacked diner owner, to be the getaway driver. Last hired is Dix Handley, who tells Doll Conovan, who is in love with him, of his dream to buy the horse farm that his family had lost after a terrible year. To access the jewelry store, Ciavelli hammers through a brick wall, deactivates an alarm to admit Doc and Dix, and uses nitroglycerine to open the safe. However, the explosion triggers several burglar alarms, and Dix slugs a security guard. The guard drops his revolver, which fires, striking Ciavelli in the abdomen. The men escape and a police manhunt begins.
Ciavelli insists that Gus take him home. Ciavelli's wife Maria wants him taken to the hospital, but Gus sends for a trusted but illicit doctor. Doc and Dix arrive at Emmerich's place, but are aware of Emmerich's attempt to stall them. Realizing this, Brannom draws a gun but is killed by Dix, who receives a flesh wound in his side. Doc scolds Emmerich for his foolish plan and tells him to offer the money to the jeweler's insurance company for 25% of its value to avoid suspicion.
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 claims that he spent the night with his mistress, Angela Phinlay. Corrupt police lieutenant Ditrich—on Cobby's payroll and fearing scrutiny by Police Commissioner Hardy—vainly attempts to save himself from ensnarement by beating Cobby into a confession. Commissioner Hardy arrests Emmerich at Angela's home and threatens her with jail for providing Emmerich with an alibi. When the police allow Emmerich to leave the room to phone his wife, he shoots himself dead.
After Gus is arrested, he attacks Cobby in the jail. The police go to Ciavelli’s to arrest him, but when they forcibly enter, they find his funeral in progress. In Doll's apartment, Doc offers Dix some of the stones, but he refuses. Doll secures a car for Dix and insists on accompanying him. Doc persuades a taxi driver to drive him to Cleveland, hours away. They stop at a roadside diner, where Doc becomes entranced by a pretty young woman dancing to the jukebox. Because of the delay, Doc is recognized by two policemen, who arrest him after finding the stolen jewels hidden in his overcoat. Suffering from blood loss, Dix faints at the wheel. He is taken to a doctor, who phones the local police to report a gunshot wound. Dix regains consciousness and escapes.
At a press conference, Hardy notes that three of the seven suspects have died, three others have been arrested and the one on the loose is a hardened killer. Back at the wheel, the rolling green fields of Bluegrass country pass as Dix speaks deliriously. Arriving at his childhood pasture, he collapses. Doll runs for help, while horses gather around him.
Cast
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Production
The film was an adaptation by director John Huston and screenwriter Ben Maddow of the 1949 novel by crime writer W. R. Burnett. It was backed by the major film studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, where it was greenlighted 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, he had written numerous books that were adapted into films shortly after publication. Huston and Maddow wrote the adaptation, which emphasized the crooks' story and reduced the police procedural aspect.<ref name=intro>Muller Eddie (June 2, 2019) Intro to the Turner Classic Movies Noir Alley presentation of the film</ref> Burnett was consulted as the shooting script was being written, and he approved the final version.<ref name=afi /> The studio allowed the production a relatively free hand.
Maddow said: "[A] lot of the power [of the film] was due to the fact that these were New York actors who all knew one another and were trying to outdo one another—and who were stimulants to one another. There was nobody who had a name of any consequence... Most of Huston's talent came in the choice of casting, which most directors will tell you anyway, in moments of frankness. It could have been quite a banal film if badly cast. Imagine Van Johnson or somebody else in the leading part! But it was not an important film, so it was easier to cast."<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
Production for 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.<ref name=afi>Template:AFI film</ref>
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 neorealism with the stylized look of film noir and Hollywood crime films.<ref name=intro /> When the film was complete, 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."<ref name=intro /><ref name=afi />
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 Alonzo Emmerich (Louis Calhern) seemed to cheat justice by killing himself.<ref name=naremore/> Neither the studio nor the censors interfered significantly with the script, however, and both the heist and the suicide were included in the final cut,<ref name=naremore/> although the suicide scene was rewritten. The original scene had Emmerich finishing a suicide note, but in the revised scene, he stalls after writing an endearing salutation to his wife May (Dorothy Tree), crumples the note and become extremely agitated about the decision to kill himself before an abrupt cutaway to an offscreen shot being heard.<ref name=afi />
Huston's first choice for the breakout role of Angela Phinlay played by Marilyn Monroe was Lola Albright, who was unavailable.<ref name=afi /> Huston invited Monroe to a screen test and rehearsed for it with her in his office. He did not feel 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."<ref name=intro />
Reception
Box office
According to MGM records, the film earned $1,077,000 in the U.S. and Canada and $1,060,000 overseas, resulting in a profit of only $40,000.<ref name="Mannix"/><ref name="scott"/>
Critical response
A contemporary review in Photoplay stated:
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This brutally frank story of crime and punishment in a Midwestern city was directed by two-time Academy Award winner, John Huston—son of the late Walter Huston. John's pictures are usually grim (The Treasure of the Sierra Madre), but always dramatic and exciting. This time he exposes the behind-the-scenes details of the robbery of a jewelry store... This picture is packed with stand-out performances... There's a beautiful blonde, too, name of Marilyn Monroe, who plays Calhern's girl friend, and makes the most of her footage.Template:Citation needed{{#if:|
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The Brooklyn Eagle's review was highly complimentary: "It's a smash picture....Sterling Hayden, Louis Calhern, Sam Jaffe and Marc Lawrence are four standout members of the cast...which has an entirely brilliant lineup of players....It goes off like clockwork, in a series of tense scenes that have the audience clutching their chair arms."<ref>Corby, Jane."Screenings." Brooklyn Eagle, 21 June 1950, 12.</ref>
At the time of its release The New York Times said of the film:
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In 1988 the Criterion Collection critic Peter Heath Becker admired Huston's technique:
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Through his experience as a painter, [Huston] learned to frame an image, and throughout the film, he uses one shot where other directors might have needed three. He dispenses with editing flourishes and over-dramatic lighting and opts instead for sustained, well-composed shots. By balancing elements in the foreground and background of his images, Huston frames events and responses at once, without cutting between them.<ref>The Asphalt Jungle Criterion Collection (February 1, 1988) accessed Sept. 13, 2016</ref>{{#if:|
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Eddie Muller noted that the film "gave an injection of realism to the postwar crime picture. Instead of the snarling miscreants seen in hundreds of gangster shoot-'em-ups, The Asphalt Jungle offered an underworld of struggling laborers, alienated loners, even honorable family men—in addition to garden-variety leeches and shysters. These were neorealist thieves, after bigger scores than bicycles."<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
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Awards and nominations
Television series
The film spawned a television series of the same name starring Jack Warden, Arch Johnson and William Smith, which ran for 13 episodes in the spring and summer of 1961 on ABC. The series resembled the film in name only, except for one episode, "The Professor", which was constructed as a sequel to the feature film. 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.<ref name="ctva" />
Legacy
Over time The Asphalt Jungle has become to be regarded as one of the more influential crime films of the 1950s.<ref name=nnat/> According to the AFI Film Catalog, the film "is widely regarded by film critics as one of John Huston's best."<ref name=afi />
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 (1963) starring George Sanders, followed by the blaxploitation film Cool Breeze (1972), directed by Barry Pollack.<ref name=afi />
The Asphalt Jungle further developed the crime thriller subgenre of caper films.<ref name=naremore/> 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, although Jules Dassin contended in later years that he did not see the film until after he made Rififi.<ref name=nnat/><ref name="nytimes">Template:Cite news</ref>
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 film was the subject of a colorization lawsuit and controversy in France. Turner Entertainment entered into an agreement with the French television channel La Cinq, to broadcast the film in artificially colorized form. John Huston's heirs objected and filed a lawsuit. 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. Finally in Turner Entertainment Co. v. Huston, on May 28, 1991, the Court of Cassation canceled the July 6 judgment, stating that colorizing the film transformed the original artwork enough to potentially transgress the author's moral rights.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
References
External links
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- Template:TCMDb title (includes detailed film synopsis and film clip)
- Template:Rotten-tomatoes
- Template:Usurped at Film Noir of the Week by film historian William Hare
- The Asphalt Jungle: “A Left-Handed Form of Human Endeavor” an essay by Geoffrey O’Brien at the Criterion Collection
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- The Asphalt Jungle essay by Daniel Eagan in America's Film Legacy: The Authoritative Guide to the Landmark Movies in the National Film Registry, A&C Black, 2010 Template:ISBN, pp. 437–438
- Pages using IMDb title instead of IMDb episode
- Pages using IMDb title instead of IMDb episodes
- 1950 films
- 1950 crime films
- 1950s heist films
- American crime thriller films
- American black-and-white films
- American heist films
- Edgar Award–winning works
- 1950s English-language films
- Film noir
- Films based on American novels
- Films set in Ohio
- Films shot in Kentucky
- Films shot in Ohio
- Films based on crime novels
- Films based on works by W. R. Burnett
- Films directed by John Huston
- Films scored by Miklós Rózsa
- Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer films
- Films with screenplays by John Huston
- United States National Film Registry films
- 1950s American films
- English-language crime films