Failure Is the Only Option/Film

Examples of Failure Is the Only Option in Film include:

• Dog Day Afternoon: The whole bank robbery was one big blunder, just like the protagonist personal life. There was hardly any money to steal, and the protagonist whole goal to leave the country with most of the hostages, scot-free, was nothing but wishful thinking.
• Dr. Strangelove: An insane US Air Force General sends his nuclear bombers to attack the Soviet Union, without orders to do so, in the belief that a lightning strike will successfully defeat the Soviets. The President and his war cabinet overcome repeated crises in order to prevent the attack from going ahead, and are almost successful, but it is all for naught. A combination of systemic and personal failures on both sides leads to the end of the world. The theme of failure is subverted in a series of vignettes in which the last remaining bomber crew go to their deaths believing that their mission was a complete success.
• The Final Destination movies: No character ever succeeded in cheating Death (as in not a single one who was supposed to die didn't eventually die a violent death). In the second movie, it looked like there were two people who did succeed, but newspaper clippings showed they died violently afterwards anyway. A character from the fifth movie managed to have someone else die in his place, but that person was going to die in a few weeks anyway, so he dies a violent death too. A second character manages to have someone die in his place (it's hard to explain) but he dies violently too because he was on a flight his girlfriend was destined to die on.
• Godzilla: The goal of the JSDF (Japanese Self-Defense Force) in nearly every film is to destroy Godzilla himself. Needless to say, they never do. And, this is even when they build weaponry specifically designed to kill Godzilla. IE: Mechagodzilla, M.O.G.U.E.R.A, Kiryu, the Dimension Tide, etc. No matter what they try some twist comes along that repowers Godzilla and lets him destroy the weapon or they are forced to use that machine to help Godzilla against a bigger threat and the machine ends up being destroyed in the process.
• The Ice Age series: No matter how hard he tries, poor little Scrat is never going to get his hands on that acorn for more than a few seconds.
• The Legacy (a 1978 horror film): The two main characters cannot leave the mansion, no matter what they try.
• Pocahontas: After Meeko breaks into his room and takes his food for absolutely no reason, Percy naturally wants revenge. As he receives a villain label merely because of association, he never gets it. Even after he disassociates himself with the villains, he still never wins.
• WALL-E: The captain seems like this (though it's worded more "Success is not an option") towards an EVE coming back positive.

Captain: No EVE has ever come back positive.