The Best '50s Heist Movies

Ranker Film
Updated June 23, 2023
Help shape these rankings by voting on this list of The Best '50s Heist Movies
Voting Rules
Vote up the best heist movies that were released in the '50s.

These are the best ‘50s heist movies. Fans of the genre know that Stanley Kubrick wrote and directed The Killing which has to be considered one of the best fifties movies about a robbery. You’ll find that these ‘50s heist movies are sophisticated in their storytelling and cinematic techniques. These fifties heist films are for you if you want to root for the thieves but also be warned that not all of the heist films from the fifties show that crime pays. Even so, they are certainly fun to watch. With famous actors such as Steve McQueen in The Great St. Louis Bank Robbery and Alex Guinness in the original The Ladykillers, ‘50s heist movies set the blueprint for some of the most memorable modern heist movies and franchises.

Other great heist movies from the fifties include the comical caper films Big Deal on Madonna Street and The Lavender Hill Mob.

Now it’s time to determine the greatest 1950s heist movies. Vote up the good ‘50s heist movies to make sure that the right film makes its way to the top of the list. Don’t see your favorite 1950s heist movie? Feel free to add it to the list.

  • The Asphalt Jungle
    1

    The Asphalt Jungle

    Sterling Hayden, Sam Jaffe, Marilyn Monroe
    6 votes
    • Released: 1950
    • Directed by: John Huston
    Recently released from prison, Dix Handley (Sterling Hayden) concocts a plan to steal $1 million in jewels. Dix gathers a team of small-time crooks, including a safecracker (Anthony Caruso) and a lawyer (Louis Calhern), and the heist is a success until a stray bullet kills one of the men. As they scramble to pick up the pieces after the theft, the men let their greed get the best of them while entangling themselves in webs of deceit, treachery and murder.

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  • The Killing
    2

    The Killing

    Sterling Hayden, Coleen Gray, Vince Edwards
    7 votes
    • Released: 1956
    • Directed by: Stanley Kubrick
    Career criminal Johnny Clay (Sterling Hayden) recruits a sharpshooter (Timothy Carey), a crooked police officer (Ted de Corsia), a bartender (Joe Sawyer) and a betting teller named George (Elisha Cook Jr.), among others, for one last job before he goes straight and marries his fiancee, Fay (Coleen Gray). But when George tells his restless wife, Sherry (Marie Windsor), about the scheme to steal millions from the racetrack where he works, she hatches a plot of her own.

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  • The Great St. Louis Bank Robbery
    3

    The Great St. Louis Bank Robbery

    Steve McQueen, Bob Holt, David Clarke
    6 votes
    • Released: 1959
    • Directed by: Charles Guggenheim, John Stix
    The Great St. Louis Bank Robbery is a 1959 heist film shot in black and white. The film stars Steve McQueen as a college dropout hired to be the getaway driver in a bank robbery. The film is based on a 1953 bank robbery attempt of Southwest Bank in St. Louis. The film was shot on location in St. Louis in 1958 with some of the men and women from the St. Louis Police Department, as well as local residents and bank employees, playing the same parts they did in the actual robbery attempt. The film is now in the public domain.
  • Odds Against Tomorrow
    4

    Odds Against Tomorrow

    Harry Belafonte, Robert Ryan, Shelley Winters
    4 votes
    • Released: 1959
    • Directed by: Robert Wise
    Disgraced former police officer David Burke (Ed Begley) is looking for a way to make some quick money. When he decides to rob a bank, he calls on mean ex-con Earl Slater (Robert Ryan) and black entertainer Johnny Ingram (Harry Belafonte) to help him pull off the heist. Johnny is reluctant to agree but is forced to reconsider because of his significant gambling debts, while racist Earl balks because of Johnny's involvement. Ultimately, though, they must work together to get the job done.

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  • Rififi
    5

    Rififi

    Jean Servais, Carl Mohner, Robert Manuel
    3 votes
    • Released: 1955
    • Directed by: Jules Dassin
    Out of prison after a five-year stretch, jewel thief Tony (Jean Servais) turns down a quick job his friend Jo (Carl Mohner) offers him, until he discovers that his old girlfriend Mado (Marie Sabouret) has become the lover of local gangster Pierre Grutter (Marcel Lupovici) during Tony's absence. Expanding a minor smash-and-grab into a full-scale jewel heist, Tony and his crew appear to get away clean, but their actions after the job is completed threaten the lives of everyone involved.
  • Kansas City Confidential
    6

    Kansas City Confidential

    John Payne, Coleen Gray, Preston Foster
    3 votes
    • Released: 1952
    • Directed by: Phil Karlson
    A mysterious fellow (Preston Foster) contacts a trio of criminals (Jack Elam, Neville Brand, Lee Van Cleef) to help with a bank heist. The four wear masks and remain strangers to each other, planning to reunite in Mexico to divvy up the loot. Joe Rolfe (John Payne), the man they framed to take the heat, gets his charges dropped, and the police offer him a reward if he can help recover the cash. He agrees, and when one of the thieves meets his end, Rolfe assumes his identity to catch the crooks.

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