The Asphalt Jungle



John Huston's brilliant crime drama The Asphalt Jungle contains the recipe for a meticulously planned robbery, but the cast of criminal characters features one too many bad apples. Sam Jaffe, as the twisted mastermind, uses cash from corrupt attorney Emmerich (Louis Calhern) to assemble a group of skilled thugs to pull off a jewel heist. All goes as planned — until an alert night watchman and a corrupt cop enter the picture.

The Asphalt Jungle was added to the National Film Registry in 2008.

"Dr Riedenschneider: Maybe you've heard of me. The Professor? Or Herr Doktor, maybe."
 * The Cameo: Marilyn Monroe has a memorable bit part as Emmerich's "niece."
 * The Caper: Deconstructed. In a normal heist movie, the thieves combine good luck with great skill, have no difficulty working together, and escape from the police to spend their stolen wealth without too much trouble. In The Asphalt Jungle, on the other hand, the thieves aren't quite skilled enough to avoid alerting the cops during the heist, have a run of bad luck starting even before they're done planning the heist, squeal on each other, and eventually every single participant is either dead or in prison, brought down by a combination of their own flaws and misfortunes. Plus, the police chief (normally a corrupt or unlikeable person in caper films where he appears at all) gives a nice speech about the importance of good law enforcement towards the end of the film.
 * Herr Doktor: Sam Jaffe's character might possibly be the Trope Namer, maybe.


 * Plethora of Mistakes: due mostly to emotional misjudgements and plain, simple bad luck.