NFR Project: 'Pickup on South Street' (1953)

 

NFR Project: “Pickup on South Street”

Dir: Samuel Fuller

Scr: Samuel Fuller

Pho: Joseph MacDonald

Ed: Nick DeMaggio

Premiere: May 27, 1953

80 min.

Sam Fuller was a guerilla filmmaker. He was always on the outside, on the margins, creating what were at the time deemed “B” movies. He worked in genre films – war, noir, Westerns.

But there was something about his work. Compared to the efforts of most Hollywood directors, his were lean and mean, with a sensibility born on the streets. He chronicled the existence of outsiders, villains, freaks, and losers. It wasn’t until 30 years after his most fertile period that he began to be recognized as a director with a distinct vision, and lauded as a brave filmmaker.

Fuller began work at age 12, serving as a newspaper copyboy. He graduated to the role of crime reporter at 17. He then began to crank out pulp novels, and finally screenplays. In World War II, he served as an infantryman and saw combat in most of the non-Pacific battlegrounds – Africa, Sicily, France, and Czechoslovakia. He witnessed the liberation of a concentration camp.

He came home and resumed writing. Finally, in 1949 he got to direct one of his scripts, I Shot Jesse James, in exchange for getting no money for it. Thus began his rise in Hollywood.

Pickup on South Street is representative Fuller. In it, a professional crook gets involved in stymieing a Communist conspiracy to steal state secrets. It is not unusual that Fuller’s protagonists are streetwise, shady individuals. It is unusual that Fuller lets them triumph over the far better organized and legitimate forces arrayed against them.

Skip McCoy (Richard Widmark, in his accustomed antihero mode) is a pickpocket working the subways of New York. He pilfers from the purse of Candy (Jean Peters), the moll of Communist agent Joey (Richard Kiley). It turns out he has stolen some valuable microfilm containing formulae the Russians want.

Federal agents and the local police are tracking him, however. A police informer, Moe (the great Thelma Ritter), fingers Skip. (This is one of Ritter's six Oscar-nominated Supporting Actress performances -- she never did win!) They demand the film; Skip denies having it. Now Candy comes to him to try to get the film back. They begin to fall for each other, but Skip ultimately spurns her, demanding $25,000 for the film.

The Commies are after him too. Joey tracks down Moe, and tries to get Skip’s address out of her. She refuses, and is shot dead. Skip recovers her body from the boat taking it to a potters’ field, and gives her what she always wanted – a decent burial. Candy comes to Skip again, clonks him over the head, and takes the film to the cops. They in turn ask her to give the film to Joey, so they can trail him and capture the man to whom he is supposed to give the film. Candy hands over the film, but Joey finds it is incomplete (Skip held back one frame). Joey beats Candy and shoots her. Skip visits her in the hospital, and determines to get Joey and his fellow conspirators.

Skip tracks Joey into the subway where the handoff is supposed to take place. He busts up the transfer, knocks out the Communist kingpin, and pursues Joey onto the tracks, beating him unmercifully. The spy ring is broken up, and Skip and Candy go off together.

Being a self-taught filmmaker, Fuller ignores most of the “rules” of Hollywood filmmaking. He captures his players in sweaty close-ups. His camera moves along with the characters, drawing the audience in with kinetic action sequences.

Politically, Fuller voices a cynical philosophy through the persona of Skip. He doesn’t care about political ideology or patriotism – but he does care about the fellow inhabitants of his shadowy world, and is spurred to action when they are harmed. It’s the human connection Fuller cares about. Personal loyalty trumps ideology. Sure, the bad guys are defeated, but there is no sense of triumph over it, only relief that Skip and Candy can now get on with their lives together. At film’s end, we don’t even know if Skip will give up his criminal ways. In Fuller’s world, only the toughest survive.

The NFR is one writer’s attempt to review all the films listed in the National Film Registry in chronological order. Next time: All My Babies.