Dix Handley from THE ASPHALT JUNGLE (1950)

Film noir and its losers...

Image from IMDb

‘The Sweater Girl’, ‘The Sigh Guy’, ‘The Oomph Girl’… some of the most ridiculous nicknames of some of Hollywood’s biggest stars. Though, if we’re talking about over-the-top, shallow monikers, I think Lana Turner, Tab Hunter, and Ann Sheridan would agree that theirs don’t come close to Sterling Hayden’s nickname… ‘The Most Beautiful Man in the Movies’. And what does one do with a nickname like that? Well, John Huston thought he should play hard-boiled criminal Dix Handley in The Asphalt Jungle, of course, and prove to everybody that he could indeed act. And so he did.

‘What’s inside of you? What’s keeping you alive?’ Dix Handley

Let’s round up the usual suspects: career criminal Doc Riedenschneider (Sam Jaffe in an Oscar-nominated performance) just got out of prison and is ready for his next heist. Cobby (Marc Lawrence) offers him money to hire men. Louis Ciavelli (Anthony Caruso) will crack the safe, Gus Minissi (James Whitmore) will drive the getaway car, and Dix Handley will work with Doc. Lawyer Alonzo Emmerich (Louis Calhern) will finance and ‘fix’ the whole thing. Written by Huston and Ben Maddow, based on the novel by W. R. Burnett, The Asphalt Jungle stands out in the film noir canon for its intense realism. Unlike many of its contemporaries, it doesn’t have a whole lot of quotable lines or even a super dark score – Miklos Rosza’s theme runs for six minutes in total, sporadically, only in key moments. It seems that Huston understood what lies beneath the noir veneer and decided to run with it. And so, apart from Harold Rosson’s slick and dark Oscar-nominated cinematography, The Asphalt Jungle is as gritty as they come. And the double-crossings! My God, the double-crossings. Because at the centre of it all, that’s what you have: horrible characters doing shady things. But one of them might not be as horrible as the others.

‘One of these days, I’ll make a real killin’ and then I’m gonna head for home.’ Dix Handley

As far as motivations go, I think Dix Handley’s reasons for taking part in the heist are some of the most noble ever put on film (noir). He wants to buy back his childhood farm, after the death of his father. Simple. Emotive. Effective. Almost a textbook type of motivation as far as scriptwriting goes. Dix is down on his luck, gambling and drinking too much. He wants to go back to the farm where he grew up as a kid, surrounding by horses, a far cry from the gritty, unnamed Midwest city he finds himself in these days. This webbed jungle just won’t cut it. He wants to get ‘the city’s dirt off him’. He doesn’t feel like there’s anything for him here. Not even…

‘I don’t know I was thinking about, bothering you this time of night; I’ll just run along’ Doll Conovan

Doll Conovan (Jean Hagen) is one of the sweetest, if not actually THE sweetest film noir character ever. She’s vulnerable, kind, caring and she’s deeply in love with Dix. In fact, she’s devoted to him. She’s… too good to be true? At least that’s what Dix thinks. You see, he’s clearly in love with her, though he tries to pretend he isn’t. Their first scene together is a dead giveaway right from the off: she runs up the stairs to his apartment and the look on his face ain’t fooling anyone. But he seems to think he doesn’t deserve her. ‘I just don’t get it’, he says, in a rare vulnerable moment. So naturally, he must push her away and let her go. And that’s what he does throughout the movie. And she still sticks by him. Right until that very, extremely, impossibly sad ending…

The Most Beautiful Man In The Movies!’ proved he was more than that throughout his career. Crime Wave (1954)? Grumpy and temperamental. The Godfather (1972)? Corrupt all the way up until he gets shot in the throat AND head by Al Pacino. The Killing (1956)? Even more grumpy and temperam- in fact, have you ever seen Sterling Hayden NOT in a tough-guy role? Dix Handley, however, might just be his best performance. A menacing stare and a cocky grin in the film’s opening line-up scene mask a complex, nuanced character, who ends up being surprisingly relatable. That scene where he takes care of Doc after he gets shot shows his human side beautifully. Despite my adoration for Louis Calhern, and a star-making performance by Marilyn Monroe, Sterling Hayden he holds the movie together for me. And what a movie. My favorite John Huston picture and indeed possibly the greatest heist movie of all time. Well, OK, Rififi (1955) isn’t too far behind.

We bid farewell to Dix Handley and The Asphalt Jungle. Next week’s loser helped her boyfriend break out of jail… only to have her heart broken time and again. The film is Raw Deal (1948), the actress is Claire Trevor and the loser… is Pat Regan.

See you on the sunny side of the street.