Jeanskynebu the audience applauded

NekoHomey Purely Joyful Movie!

Mandeep Tyson The acting in this movie is really good.

Josephina Great story, amazing characters, superb action, enthralling cinematography. Yes, this is something I am glad I spent money on.

hrkepler Arrogant smart aleck pickpocket Skip McCoy (Richard Widmark) really picks on the wrong purse when he snatches a wallet from Candy (Jean Peters). Both of them had no idea that the wallet consisted a microfilm with top-secret government secrets meant for communist spies.Screenplay is masterfully written, right on the point stuff without too much unnecessary fat, characters are well developed, story flows so naturally that none of the twists and turns take too much focus on one singular moment. I guess Samuel Fuller's journalist background has something to do with it. Smooth and detailed direction with nice nuances and touches almost unnoticeable - scene where Candy discovers that her wallet is gone from the purse, an alarm goes off in the background.Richard Widmark is in his usual top form as arrogant pickpocket with heart at right place and Jean Peters is wonderfully natural as punching bag, but never just as damsel in distress. Thelma Ritter gives warm and interesting performance as street stoolie Moe (no wonder she received six Academy Award nominations including one for this role). Rest of the supporting cast deserves high recognition also without pointing anyone particular.With 'Pickup on South Street' Samuel Fuller's potential and craftsmanship as a director really came together and the result is well written, masterfully directed and magnificently acted smooth film-noir.

Maddyclassicfilms Pickup on South Street is directed by Samuel Fuller, is written by Fuller and Dwight Taylor and is based on Taylor's novel. The film stars Richard Widmark, Jean Peters, Richard Kiley and Thelma Ritter.This is one of my favourite Noir films. Widmark and Peters sizzle together and deliver superb performances as two tough characters realising they're falling for one another.On a crowded train, skilled pickpocket Skip McCoy(Richard Widmark)rummages through the handbag of Candy(Jean Peters), he steals some microfilm. Unbeknown to Skip the film contains top secret US government documents that Candy is delivering to a communist agent. Skip also doesn't know that he was seen taking the film by two agents who were following Candy.Skip hides the film but then finds himself questioned by the Police. He's soon wanted by Candy's boyfriend Joey(Richard Kiley), who wants the film back so he can deliver it to his fellow communists. Candy is sent to get the film back, she tries to charm him but Skip sees right through her, her admires her courage though and as time goes on the pair begin to fall for one another. Candy's association with Skip puts her in danger when Joey no longer trusts her.Widmark gives one of his best performances, he makes Skip clever, tough, cynical and a real survivor. You know this is a man you don't want to cross and although he's a thief he's not a bad man, he'll do the right thing in the end. Skip has seen and done plenty of bad things but he is still a good man, he hasn't crossed a moral line and become a bad guy.Jean Peters is an actress who I think should have become a much bigger star. She is at her best here as the tough, streetwise woman who falls for Skip and tries to do the right thing, even if that means risking her own life.Thelma Ritter is superb as stoolpigeon Moe. This lady is smart and doesn't miss anything. Moe's greatest fear is being buried in an unmarked grave. Throughout the film she is shown trying to collect money to put aside to ensure she can have a decent funeral, that is incredibly sad and Ritter makes your heart break for this woman and her situation.The three main characters in this are all down on their luck and all deserve to be happy. They all do things that they might not be proud of in order to survive, far from making us hate them this only humanises them, they aren't perfect and their characters are more developed than in some films like this and that all helps make the film as good as it is.In my opinion this is one of the best Noir films ever made.

romanorum1 At film's beginning we see a NY subway so crowded that the neurosis of claustrophobia oppresses us. Folks keep piling on, but no one disembarks. A pickpocket (we soon learn is Skip McCoy = Richard Widmark), a three-time loser, skillfully removes a woman's wallet from her purse. The pickpocket is seen by FBI agent Zara (Willis B. Bouchery), but McCoy nevertheless gets away. It seems that the woman, Candy (Jean Peters), was being tailed by Zara all along. Her wallet contains a valuable microfilm (describing a chemical formula) wanted by the Communists. Candy was passing it on to her sleazy boyfriend Joey (Richard Kiley), a Communist sympathizer. Candy does not know final destination of the microfilm. McCoy knows nothing about the microfilm; he just wants to make a quick buck.Zara consults with Captain Dan Tiger (Murvyn Vye), who in turn relies on Moe Williams (Thelma Ritter), a street peddler who sells ties. Moe is a police paid informer who has a price for keeping keeps tabs on underworld figures in the neighborhood. She lives in a shabby tenement, but is saving enough cash for a fancy funeral. She tells Capt. Tiger, "I've got almost enough to buy both the stone and the plot." With new information the lawmen go to McCoy's bare-bones waterfront shack without electricity (but note how he stores stuff) on the East River. One of cops is Detective Winoki, played by Milburn Stone, later to star as Doc Adams in the very long-running and successful TV series, "Gunsmoke." The cops demand the microfilm. As Skip balks, he is summarily taken down to the precinct. Tiger tells McCoy, "If you refuse to co-operate, you will be just as guilty as the traitors who gave Stalin the A-bomb!" McCoy boldly retorts, "Are you waving the flag at me?" Candy eventually helps the authorities, and even Moe hinders the bad Commies. Likewise, McCoy changes his tune, but for a reason different than that of the feds. There is a climax involving a terrific fist fight between two antagonists on the subway tracks. Richard Widmark as the cocky hood is good as always. The line of the movie is delivered by Thelma Ritter, in a marvelous performance as Moe. "If I was to be buried in Potter's Field, it'd just about kill me." Ritter lost out to Donna Reed ("From Here to Eternity") for the Oscar as Best Supporting Actress. Joe MacDonald shoots this one in tight close-up, especially the wallet snatch. Watch how Lightning Louie (Vic Perry) gobbles his noodles from the bowl close to his mouth and how he fetches Candy's $20 bills. The contiguous shot effect (often without extraneous dialog) brings out the tension sustained by each character: note the furrows, the sweat, and the quivering lips. See how well MacDonald captures the overcrowded subway, the shots of New York City, Moe's tenement, the bait shop along the waterfront. Cigar-smoking director Sam Fuller has at least three films elected to the American National Film Registry, "Shock Corridor," "The Big Red One" (the nickname for the 1st infantry division where he served in World War II) and "VE + 1." The latter is a short about the liberation of Falkenau concentration camp.

Dalbert Pringle Due to its excessive brutality and sadistic beatings (especially the rough slapping around of pretty Candy), this rough'n'tough Crime/Thriller from 1953 ran into a lot of serious flak from the censors prior to its initial release.In order to appease the picky censor board's pointless grumblings, several violent scenes were quickly re-shot and even a "cutesy-pie", little happy ending was tacked onto the story for good measure.And because this film's theme dealt directly with Communist espionage on American turf, FBI agent, J. Edgar Hoover, even got into the act and complained to Darryl F. Zanuck (then head of 20th Century Fox) about the unpatriotic attitude of Richard Widmark's lippy character and his "Are you waving the flag at me?" line.Of course (as you can well-imagine), the whole controversy that all of this silly attention stirred up prior to "Pickup's" initial release did absolute wonders as a means of advertising and, thus, selling it to the curious movie-going public, and generating big box-office bucks.Pickup's story deals with the serious events that are set into motion after the brazen pickpocket, Skip McCoy, steals a wallet being carried by pretty, little Candy.Unknown to both Skip and Candy, this innocent-looking wallet actually contains a strip of microfilm of top-secret information that was being delivered to a group of ruthless Communist spies operating within the seedy underworld of NYC.Filmed in stark b&w, this hard-edged Crime/Drama had a running time of only 80 minutes. It was directed by Samuel Fuller whose other films from the 1950s included Forty Guns, Hell and High Water, and Underworld USA.