Noir Chronicles: It's a Living

 

PICKUP ON SOUTH STREET (1953) (B+) - Richard Widmark smirks and scowls his way through a taut thriller about a pickpocket who unwittingly swipes a woman's wallet that contains nuclear secrets, which envelops him in a spy caper. 

 

Samuel Fuller ("The Naked Kiss") writes and directs this sharp, slick procedural full of juicy characters and snappy dialogue. Widmark plays it cool as the feds put the screws to him to hand over the film negatives that were in the wallet; meantime, the commie symps ratchet the heat on him too. Caught in the intrigue is the unwitting dame, Candy (Jean Peters), who can't help but start to fall for Widmark's Skip McCoy (even though their meet-cute involves a right hook to the chin).

The ringer here is Thelma Ritter ("All About Eve," "Pillow Talk") as Moe, the necktie-peddling snitch who makes her nut playing both sides. Ritter runs rings around her castmates, bringing depth and soul to a traditional side role. 

Fuller has fun with McCoy's digs, a waterfront shack where the grifter keeps his beer cold by storing it submerged in the water in a contraption that also safely houses his ill-gotten goods. In one memorable scene, Fuller shoots from floor level over the shoulder of McCoy, who is lounging in a hammock, looking up at a cop grilling him. Widmark and Peters steam things up with barely a kiss. There is style to burn and a story that will keep you on your toes until the end.

SPOTTED: Milburn Stone is a police detective. He had 168 movie and TV credits but only one after 1958 -- when he signed on as Doc on "Gunsmoke" and rode that for 605 episodes until its cancellation in 1975.

THE BIG CLOCK (1948) (B-minus) - File this one under serviceable post-war journalism thrillers. George Stroud (Ray Milland) has had it with his oppressive publisher, Earl Janoth (Charles Laughton), and ends up ousted as editor of Crimeways magazine, which investigates various illicit incidents. When Janoth's mistress ends up dead, Stroud must head up the investigation without his staff finding out that he spent the evening with her, shunning his wife and their planned trip to West Virginia.

It's no secret pretty early on that Janoth is the killer (he acted in a spasm of jealousy), and he uses a yes-man to cover his tracks and the entire staff to pursue every lead about the "mystery man" who spent the evening with the dead woman. The staff uses modern techniques like data analysis to sift through clues, and Janoth is obsessed with the precise time, placing a massive clock on the front of the building that houses his publishing empire. The innards of that clock, blinking like a giant computer, will be the scene of a climactic showdown. And there is a small antique sundial that will be used as the murder weapon. (Talk about getting clocked ...)

Journeyman director John Farrow has fun in the final third of the film, when the action is confined to the corporate headquarters and characters scamper up and down stairs and elevators and through offices. Milland ("The Lost Weekend") is a solid lead, and Laughton, sporting an unfortunate mustache, is a mush-mouthed oddball. Elsa Lanchester has fun as an artist caught up in the chaos, and Maureen O'Sullivan (Farrow's wife) sizzles as the slighted spouse. The cutthroat world of magazine circulation wars is parodied to the hilt, and this is a fun knew-dunnit to watch unfold.

SPOTTED: Henry Morgan is a mute henchman for the big boss. He would go on to a TV career as Officer Bill Gannon on "Dragnet" and Col. Potter on "MASH."