Customer Reviews:

Avg. Customer Rating: 4.6 / 5.0

A top notch film noir:

Skip Mc Coy (Richard Widmark) is a person without colective importance; a rough pickpocket , a scroungy pretty gangster who sneeks a look into a woman's handbag, turns up some microfilm and finds himself dealing with communist agents.
This is a well made film, with a lot of issues. Moe (Thelma Ritter)overtakes this role as a street peddler who sells information.
A film which reveals as a few, the sordid and sinister underworld linked with the spy world which is blackmailed by a pedestrian thief.... more info

top-level film noir:

Better than most film noir entries, Samuel Fuller's PICKUP ON SOUTH STREET explores the life of a pickpocket who gets in over his head. Skip McCoy picks a pocket on the subway, and gets classified government documents for his troubles.

The police convince a woman to help them find Skip and the microfilm, and heavy drama ensues. Thelma Ritter is especially good as the informant. Today her acting would be considered over-the-top and unconvincing, but for the time, it was a standout performance. Widmark is... more info

missed opportunity:

Made during the height of the cold war hysteria,
this film gets sidetracked by mindless red baiting.
It also descends into cheesy melodrama on a couple of
occasions marring the pacing of the movie. It's too
bad but pickup doesn't live up to its reputation as
top notch noir.

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