| If there is but one thing for which we must thank the much overrated Quentin Tarantino, it is that his appreciation for the films of American director Samuel Fuller led to a renewed public interest in Fuller’s oeuvre in the mid-1990s. I can’t prove it, but it wouldn’t surprise me if Tarantino discovered Fuller by way of yet another of his obsessions, Jean-Luc Godard, who famously featured Fuller in his 1965 film Pierre le Fou. Whatever the case, Fuller’s influence on popular cinema has continued to be felt – palpably – over the past 50 years, although almost anyone he has inspired would probably admit that Fuller’s movies are much more exciting than their own.
Or, as Martin Scorsese puts it in his introduction to Fuller’s posthumously published memoirs – quoted in the beefy booklet that accompanies the new Criterion Collection DVD of the hard-boiled film noir Pickup on South Street (U.S., 1953) – "If you don’t like the films of Sam Fuller, then you just don’t like cinema."
Even Scorsese admits he may be overstating things slightly, but certainly if you can’t enjoy Pickup on South Street, you must not like film noir. With pulpy dialogue penned by a former tabloid journalist (Fuller himself, natch), this unconventional thriller – about a light-fingered pickpocket (Richard Widmark) who accidentally nabs a microfilm containing state secrets destined for the Commies – lingers in the gloomy shadows of Cold War America as only the darkest noirs dared to do. Moreover, in addition to the colourful repartee, the entire film is constructed from Fuller’s dizzying black-and-white imagery, cinematographer Joe McDonald’s camera at times placing us right inside the amoral mind of a petty thief struggling to keep his delicate hands – if not his nose – clean.
Interestingly, Widmark’s Skip McCoy is just one of many complex characters populating the New York City of Pickup on South Street. There’s also Candy (Jean Peters), the hot-buttered "muffin" from whom Skip has lifted his big trophy, much to the chagrin of her boss and boyfriend, Joe (Richard Kiley), the desperate Communist agent. Also running interference is the elderly stoolie, Moe (Thelma Ritter), a nosy know-it-all who traffics in information, padding her bankroll so she won’t have to be buried anonymously in potter’s field.
Given the era in which it was made, Pickup on South Street is hardly pro-Communist, but the film nevertheless smuggles in an existentialist critique of the capitalist grind. This is particularly true of the world-weary dramatic monologues delivered by Ritter, who states at one point, "It’s so hard to get up in the morning and get dressed and walk the streets, climb the stairs. I go right on doing it…. I have to go on making a living so I can die. But even a fancy funeral ain’t worth waiting for if I’ve got to do business with crumbs like you."
In this way, Pickup on South Street idealizes the criminal demimonde, at least in relation to the more rigidly ideological dogmatism propagated by both sides in the Cold War. Even Skip, a three-time loser who can’t risk a fourth conviction – and a certain trip to the state pen – isn’t interested in any of that "flag-waving stuff." Threaten him with charges of treason, and he’s still more concerned with fencing his confidential haul to the highest bidder.
Certainly, Skip is an opportunist to the end, but even he softens – or perhaps hardens – when Candy sashays into the picture. From her very first scene in the film, you can see the sweat beading on Peters’s brow as she steams up the screen. Painted up, and spilling out of her low-cut ensembles, Candy is hardly a redemptive force. But neither is Skip one to be redeemed, as Pickup on South Street shows us that what motivates people most is not ideology but sheer desperation, something which suffuses every frame of this eminently entertaining film.
Ultimately, whether one discovers Fuller by way of Tarantino, Godard, Scorsese or some other source, the most important thing is that his movies continue to be admired for generations to come. Pickup on South Street is not the first of his films to receive the Criterion treatment, although the two illuminating interviews with the cigar-chomping filmmaker provide a thorough introduction to the man and his work. His personality seems to fill up the screen, making it clear that Fuller’s ability to create such vivid characters must have laid in the fact that he was one himself. |
Copyright ©2004 FFWD. All rights reserved.