Delitto nella strada

I just saw this movie at the Don S. film festival at Film Forum, and this movie was surprisingly better than I could have expected. While it is a little preachy at times, the performances by Cassevetes and Mineo are mind-blowing in how touching and nuanced they are at such a young age.

From the beginning it is clear that this film was made on a small set in Hollywood, but you quickly forget about this and can easily become wrapped up in the story - an almost reverse Crime and Punishment parable. Cassevetes and Mineo overcome an of the actors' deficiencies even though most of the other performances such as the mother, Mineo's father, are also superb (the only truly cornball performances come from the preachy social worker, the sappy little brother and a couple of the stereotyped gang members).

The director does an amazing job of making this small slum world feel so small (the set is probably half a city block in size on the set) and tense.

Film Forum displayed Scorcese's personal copy, which was unfortunately quite damaged. Hopefully, the studio which owns this film will reprint a clean 35 mm copy or print a restored DVD. For fans of the "youth gone wild" genre or simple of Cassevetes, this movie is a true waiting-to-be rediscovered gem

I don't want to elaborate too much on what's already been said, but 1956's "Crime in the Streets" becomes claustrophobic very quickly because of the shabby, back-lot "New York street" that screams artificial 1930s Hollywood set a la "Dead End" and "Scarface." Since this is an Allied Artists film, I'm guessing it was shot at the old Monogram Studios on Sunset Boulevard in East Hollywood, which was shabby even in the 1930s. Perhaps Don Siegel was looking for claustrophobia and delapidation to enhance the atmosphere, but more likely they were simply a product of a low budget. (After all, Siegel had already used the real-life streets of Hollywood and the nearby town of Sierra Madre to great effect a year earlier in "Invasion of the Body Snatchers.") Though no source material is given for "Crime in the Streets" except for the original teleplay, it owes quite a lot to Hal Ellson and other social workers-turned-writers who cranked out top-selling novels in the late '40s and early '50s, such as "Duke" and "The Golden Spike," that explored the tribulations of growing up in poor, urban, ethnic American neighborhoods. Also unacknowledged is Clyde McPhatter and the Drifters' rhythm and blues hit, "Such a Night," which provided Mark Rydell's character (clearly the movie's most interesting) with the "ba-dooby-dobby-doo" riff that became a jazz motif when the boys were awaiting their big crime in the alley.

A social worker tries to tame a street gang. Cassavetes is pretty good in his second film credit, although he was a bit old at 26 to be playing a teen. Rydell is quite creepy in his film debut as a psychotic gang member who can't conceal his glee at the thought of committing murder. Rydell, like Cassavetes, went on to become a director. His second film role would not come until 1973 in Robert Altman's "The Long Goodbye," when he played another frightening character. Mineo plays a character not unlike the one had just played in "Rebel Without a Cause." In his follow-up to "Invasion of the Body Snatchers," Siegel creates a gritty atmosphere but stresses the melodramatics.

Working on a painfully thin budget from Allied Artists, Don Siegel managed to fashion an urban tale of violence and juvenile delinquency in Crime In The Streets. The urban sets remind me a lot of Otto Preminger's The Man With A Golden Arm which came out a year before. And the delinquents aren't romanticized as they are in West Side Story.

James Whitmore stars as a local social worker working out of a settlement house who keeps his ear to the ground for any rumblings of a rumble on the mean streets of his urban neighborhood. With two gangs, the Hornets and the Dukes, he's got his hands full.

It's the Hornets here that concern the viewer of Crime In The Streets. They have a charismatic leader in young John Cassavetes who at 27 is way too old to be playing an 18 year old, but so did most of the kids look way too old in Glenn Ford's class in The Blackboard Jungle. Cassavetes is repeating his role from this same story made as television drama two years earlier. Also repeating are Mark Rydell as one of Cassavetes lieutenants who really isn't wrapped too tight and Will Kulava as Sal Mineo's father.

When local citizen Malcolm Atterbury reports one of their peers for having a zip gun, Cassavetes sets in motion a plan to kill him. Mineo and Rydell are in on it. Whitmore gets wind of it and does what he can to stop it.

Don Siegel gets good performances out of his ensemble cast. One player I failed to mention is Virginia Gregg who may have gotten her career role as the mother of Cassavetes and Peter Votrian. Cassavetes she feels is a lost cause, she's concerned about Votrian who idolizes his brother and might get into the gang culture. Gregg is great example of one who was probably a battered wife when she had a husband living in the place and one who is too shell shocked to deal with her rebellious son.

Though it's dated Crime In The Streets is still entertaining and it's a good sociological treatise on juvenile delinquency.

It's New York City. The neighborhood has gone to hell as gangs of youths beat up on each other. Frankie Dane (John Cassavetes) leads the Hornets. Local Mr. McAllister talks to the police and gets Lenny arrested. Frankie vows revenge while social worker Ben Wagner (James Whitmore) tries to save him.

Cassavetes is in his mid 20's while playing an 18 year old. He looks too old and is already graduated to a gangster. Along with the stage set and play aesthetics, there is an artificiality to the film. Despite that, Cassavetes delivers a good energy in his character with more brutality than an afterschool special. All in all, this is interesting for Cassavetes fans.