Spotlight

Spotlight Date: 26-July-09
Spoiler Rating: Medium

The Asphalt Jungle (1950)

Late in John Huston's classic The Asphalt Jungle, a police commissioner praises his boys in blue for preventing man's animalistic nature from taking over society. It is a well crafted moment that does not fit the picture. While the movie falls into the cops-and-robbers genre, the cops are secondary and the robbers are not beasts. Cities may be places where bold men flout laws designed to protect the weak, but in this "Jungle" the criminals bear the stamp of humanity.

The plot revolves around a jewel heist masterminded by a strange fellow called "Doc" Riedenschneider (Sam Jaffe), who arrives in the city just days after leaving jail. Although he resembles an accountant who has lived with his mother too long, Doc possesses nerves of steel and a reputation that opens doors. He quickly finds financial backing from a corrupt lawyer (Louis Calhern) and hires a safecracker (Anthony Caruso) and a getaway driver (James Whitmore). He also befriends a roughneck named Dix (Sterling Hayden) whose fists and willingness to use them might come handy in a pinch.

Unlike its descendants (Topkapi, Ocean's Eleven, etc.), The Asphalt Jungle generates interest in its thieves without relying on wit and sexiness. The men are not entirely appealing, but they are entirely human. The safecracker is a devoted family man and the driver a devoted friend, both vulnerable through attachments to other people. The lawyer is a snake capable of shame and kindness to his mistress (a young Marilyn Monroe). Doc cleverly negotiates the heist and its aftermath, which includes shootings and double-crosses, only to allow his appetite for young ladies to put him at risk. (This appetite denotes loneliness and lechery; it is a social urge more than a predatory one.) Last but not least, Dix is driven by a yearning to return to the Kentucky home of his childhood, there to recapture simplicity and maybe settle down with the girl who adores him (Jean Hagen).

Huston does not pull any punches in showing the seedy world which these men inhabit. However, The Asphalt Jungle is not as hard-boiled as its title suggests. The criminals' need for home and connection reveals that not all defenses against the modern jungle are external. Primitive nature might persist in urban surroundings, but people's softer instincts are at least as powerful as their vicious ones.

Copyright © 2009 The Jujube (M. I. Kim). All rights reserved.