SPOILERS. Sam Fuller, as someone pointed out, was usually a better interview subject than a director. What a life he led. There's an early photo of him as a newspaperman, feet on his desk, hat tilted back on his head, smoking a cigarette -- straight out of "The Front Page." Then, column two: the U.S. Army's First Division, the Big Red One, and World War II with experiences that he could never forget. For years afterward he could not hear a car backfire, or a knock on a door, without jumping out of his chair. Column three: movie director.
The French adored him. His style was called "primitive" by some, and in fact it was down to earth and unsophisticated, rather like an article in, well, not the New York Times but maybe the New York Daily News. Or the Post. Well, not the Post. All of his movies moved fast, the way Fuller himself spoke. Everything seemed to tumble over itself trying to get on screen with little time left for contemplation.
I haven't seen all of his movies, but I believe he produced two unusually good ones: "Merrill's Marauders" and "Pick Up on South Street." Too many of the others come out like comic books. This one ha several excellent things going for it. First, a fine cast. Richard Widmark as Skip McCoy, the cannon, is good in a way that combines his insouciant charm and the brutality he showed in his early work. Jean Peters too is convincing in the tarty part of Candy. (Great name.) She's more animated here than in any other of her films. (In "Apache," I believe you could add up all of her lines AND her expressions on the fingers of one hand.) Fuller got a good performance out of her here. "What's the matter, Joey? You're talking' like it's HOT." She wears very heavy makeup. Her black eyelashes are the size of window awnings, even when she's bundled up in a hospital bed. She even trounces around in a sluttish way. Richard Kiley is an actor I've always admired. He's quite handsome in a blandly dark and sensitive-looking way, and his range was considerable: a villain here, a humanist there, a narrator of poetry on PBS. And then there is Thelma Ritter, who is sui generis, at the top of her form as the cynical wisecracking urbanite, perhaps more subdued here, and given a more complex part. She didn't make that many movies but she was a beacon in each one.
The plot? Let me see. Widmark, the expert pickpocket, boosts a roll of film from the innocent Jean Peters' pocketbook. Neither of them know it, but the film is a MacGuffin containing some kind of secret microfilm to be passed on to the Commies. Widmark's response when he learns this, as the cops try to pressure him into cooperating: a smile of disbelief and, "You wavin' the flag at ME?" (He's great.) Most of the movie is concerned with Kiley's attempts to retrieve the film before his bosses off him, and before the cops find out what's going on. People routinely betray one another, then forgive. They also casually brutalize one another. Jean Peters especially gets knocked around. First she's clipped on the jaw and is knocked out at her first meeting with Skip. (The movie follows the usual short-cuts: one bop and the recipient is out cold for as long as the plot requires.) The first thing Widmark does is grin widely and go through her purse, then he takes a swig of beer out of the bottle before pouring some on her face to wake her up. (As I said, all the conventions are followed because it just saves time.) But she really gets bashed by Joey, the Commie who is trying to squeeze some intel out of her. She is so vulnerable. Just out of the tub, still wet, wrapped in a white robe with a hood covering her hair. Fuller holds on the beating with a single shot and a shaky camera as the two of them reel around the room and Peters is bounced off walls and caromes into bookcases, and is finally shot and wounded. It's one of the few moments when the viewer is gripped, because the drama is not undercut by irony. The other scene involves Thelma Ritter. Jean Peters falls much too quickly for Widmark, though. You can't help noticing it because by their second meeting she is hopelessly devoted to him. It's all the more odd because Widmark can't seem to keep himself from belting her around and ridiculing her at every opportunity. Of course this sort of masculine behavior may appeal to some women. It's always worked for me. A couple of unprovoked clips on the jaw and they worship you.
How does Fuller handle all this? With aplomb. The production values don't shoot out the lights. The non-electrified shack that Widmark lives in could have been given some real atmosphere, but as it is it's nothing more than a perfunctory set, with a "Bait and Tackle" sign on the outside. What appears to be the Brooklyn Bridge can be glimpsed through the window (an obvious photo), which means that the owner of the shack used to sell fishing gear on the East River, from which nobody could pull anything but porgy with cholera sauce. Fuller ignores all this and zips through the movie headlong, the way a reporter might try to bang out an article under a deadline. Sometimes the approach works, and sometimes it doesn't. Here, it does. See it if you get the chance.
The French adored him. His style was called "primitive" by some, and in fact it was down to earth and unsophisticated, rather like an article in, well, not the New York Times but maybe the New York Daily News. Or the Post. Well, not the Post. All of his movies moved fast, the way Fuller himself spoke. Everything seemed to tumble over itself trying to get on screen with little time left for contemplation.
I haven't seen all of his movies, but I believe he produced two unusually good ones: "Merrill's Marauders" and "Pick Up on South Street." Too many of the others come out like comic books. This one ha several excellent things going for it. First, a fine cast. Richard Widmark as Skip McCoy, the cannon, is good in a way that combines his insouciant charm and the brutality he showed in his early work. Jean Peters too is convincing in the tarty part of Candy. (Great name.) She's more animated here than in any other of her films. (In "Apache," I believe you could add up all of her lines AND her expressions on the fingers of one hand.) Fuller got a good performance out of her here. "What's the matter, Joey? You're talking' like it's HOT." She wears very heavy makeup. Her black eyelashes are the size of window awnings, even when she's bundled up in a hospital bed. She even trounces around in a sluttish way. Richard Kiley is an actor I've always admired. He's quite handsome in a blandly dark and sensitive-looking way, and his range was considerable: a villain here, a humanist there, a narrator of poetry on PBS. And then there is Thelma Ritter, who is sui generis, at the top of her form as the cynical wisecracking urbanite, perhaps more subdued here, and given a more complex part. She didn't make that many movies but she was a beacon in each one.
The plot? Let me see. Widmark, the expert pickpocket, boosts a roll of film from the innocent Jean Peters' pocketbook. Neither of them know it, but the film is a MacGuffin containing some kind of secret microfilm to be passed on to the Commies. Widmark's response when he learns this, as the cops try to pressure him into cooperating: a smile of disbelief and, "You wavin' the flag at ME?" (He's great.) Most of the movie is concerned with Kiley's attempts to retrieve the film before his bosses off him, and before the cops find out what's going on. People routinely betray one another, then forgive. They also casually brutalize one another. Jean Peters especially gets knocked around. First she's clipped on the jaw and is knocked out at her first meeting with Skip. (The movie follows the usual short-cuts: one bop and the recipient is out cold for as long as the plot requires.) The first thing Widmark does is grin widely and go through her purse, then he takes a swig of beer out of the bottle before pouring some on her face to wake her up. (As I said, all the conventions are followed because it just saves time.) But she really gets bashed by Joey, the Commie who is trying to squeeze some intel out of her. She is so vulnerable. Just out of the tub, still wet, wrapped in a white robe with a hood covering her hair. Fuller holds on the beating with a single shot and a shaky camera as the two of them reel around the room and Peters is bounced off walls and caromes into bookcases, and is finally shot and wounded. It's one of the few moments when the viewer is gripped, because the drama is not undercut by irony. The other scene involves Thelma Ritter. Jean Peters falls much too quickly for Widmark, though. You can't help noticing it because by their second meeting she is hopelessly devoted to him. It's all the more odd because Widmark can't seem to keep himself from belting her around and ridiculing her at every opportunity. Of course this sort of masculine behavior may appeal to some women. It's always worked for me. A couple of unprovoked clips on the jaw and they worship you.
How does Fuller handle all this? With aplomb. The production values don't shoot out the lights. The non-electrified shack that Widmark lives in could have been given some real atmosphere, but as it is it's nothing more than a perfunctory set, with a "Bait and Tackle" sign on the outside. What appears to be the Brooklyn Bridge can be glimpsed through the window (an obvious photo), which means that the owner of the shack used to sell fishing gear on the East River, from which nobody could pull anything but porgy with cholera sauce. Fuller ignores all this and zips through the movie headlong, the way a reporter might try to bang out an article under a deadline. Sometimes the approach works, and sometimes it doesn't. Here, it does. See it if you get the chance.