There's a good argument that The Asphalt Jungle deserves that title, but this could well be considered the true heist film which inspired other heist films such as The Taking of Pelham One Two Three, Money Train, Heat, Ronin, Mission Impossible and the Ocean's franchise. What do you think?
Captain Warren 'Rip' Murdock: I'm the brass-knuckles-in-the-teeth-to-dance-time type.
Rififi is the best I believe
shareI'm thinkin more of age than which was best, but yes, come to think of it, Rififi did come out a year earlier and therefore would be more deserving than this one for the grandfather title.
Captain Warren 'Rip' Murdock: I'm the brass-knuckles-in-the-teeth-to-dance-time type.
Rififi came out a year earler, but they were both shot roughly at the same time. So I don't think either was influenced by the other.
Asphalt jungle still predates them bout by about 5 years, but Jungle didn't focus as much on the actual heist.
"Rape is no laughing matter. Unless you're raping a clown."
"Asphalt Jungle" does indeed predate the other films, but it's more notable as the first film to realistically depict a heist scene and pretty much set the standard tropes of the heist film, i.e. rounding up a crew. In the 1930s film "Little Caesar" there is a heist shown by Rico and his gang as they rob a hotel, but it's such a very rapid montage we only get the basic idea they robbed the joint (it was made around the Hayes code era, they didn't exactly want to teach anyone how to be a better criminal with the film, hence the omission).
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Yeah, I'm so bad I kick my own ass twice a day.
-Creeper, the Hamburger Pimp from "Dolemite"
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Rififi without question. One of the only 10/10 movies I have rated. Hitch's Rebecca is another 10/10.
They do not make films close to what these two represent.
PERFECT Film-making
Sorry to deviate from the original poster's topic, about the predecessors to the modern heist film ("Great Train Robbery" maybe, c. 1903? Though as I state before Houston deserves the title more than anyone as originator and perhaps the earliest, truest spiritual predecessor)...but now I wonder, what is it that makes a good heist film? Is it a realistic depiction of a heist or an exciting one? I'm personally drawn to the former...
I just watched Jacques Becker's "Le Trous"--it's about a prison escape, not a heist, but it's crime scenes resemble "Rififi" in that they both try to approximate real time and sound in their depictions (compared to say Dassin's own "Brute Force"). You basically participate in the crime with the criminals, the long, arduous, sometimes repetitive, tasks of the scheme; you can really feel the tension when a loud noise breaks the valuable silence of their actions.
Melville's "Un Flic" (his last film and probably his worst--not bad, just relatively poorer) has an elaborate heist scene involving a helicopter landing on a train and it just seems a little too ridiculous, I believe the bank robbery at the beginning of the film is actually a better scene, beautifully washed out in blue and moreover meticulously and meditatively composed. Similarly in his "Le Cercle Rouge" the jewelry store heist is done more realistically and the stakes are just that more palpable.
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Also on a side note, for kgun12 and anyone else that liked "Rififi," if you haven't already seen it check out "Big Deal on Madonna Street" it's an Italian spoof of the movie, it's also pretty hilarious.
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Yeah, I'm so bad I kick my own ass twice a day.
-Creeper, the Hamburger Pimp from "Dolemite"
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The temporal structure of "The Killing" was regarded by Jean Luc Godard (in his review for Cahiers du Cinema) as something of a gimmick. He also felt the circumstances of the ending were irrelevant in its significance, the little dog as a symbol of fate was pretty contrived, and could have been more artfully represented. I would personally disagree with the former, but definitely agree with the latter, especially when considering the carefully intricate construction of the film as a whole.
shareThe funny thing about this topic is, Bob Le Flambeur is not really a heist movie--no heist ever occurs, even if it is planned. It is a movie about a gambler who remains a gambler despite plotting to be otherwise. The ending is ingenious in how it makes this clear.
shareBut the heist does occur--and it fails magnificently. Really, it just doesn't progress past the first step, as the crew is gunned down by the coppers with the initial siege of the casino. But I understand what you're saying, the typical heist scene is absent and appropriately so in this atypical heist movie.
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Yes, it's actually a character study rather than a heist movie.
shareThis is a great Melville movie. Also there was a Nick Nolte remake of Flambeur set in Nice that wasn’t bad. What is great about the 50s Flambeur movie Is that there is suspense for the heist and the gambling table at the same time. There’s irony in who wins and who loses. Similar to that same irony in the James Coburn movie Dead Heat on a Merry go round. Most of Melville’s movies are heist movies and that’s why I think he’s my favorite. Le Doulos, Un Flic, Lina Ventura ones. Grisbi. Rififi. But you can’t forget Michael Mann’s Heat. And there was the original Italian Job that was a real cliffhanger. But I think French crime which usually involves a heist has always been the best except for Heat which is such a great movie as an American one. And Asphalt Jungle of course.
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