S2 Ep. 6: Pickup on South Street (1953; dir. Samuel Fuller) w/ guest Stephen Gillespie

“Are you waving the flag at me?”

The Cold War Cinema team returns to look at Samuel Fuller’s 1954 noir masterpiece, Pickup on South Street, with special guest Stephen Gillespie, film critic and cohost of The STACKS and I’m Thinking of Spoiling Things. When small-time thief Skip McCoy picks the wrong pocket on a busy subway car, he quickly becomes the most popular lowlife in town, trailed by crooked cops, the feds, and a Communist spy ring. 

Join Stephen and hosts Jason Christian and Paul T. Klein as they discuss:

• Why J. Edgar Hoover hated this movie.

• How the film makes sense of Cold War paranoia through its critique of American ideological systems 

• Pickup on South Street’s depiction of the down-and-out and three-time losers that populate America’s urban landscapes, and how the film suggests they got there.

• Writer-director Samuel Fuller’s provocative and ultimately idealist politics

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Each episode features book and film recommendations for further exploration. On this episode: 

• Stephen recommends Samuel Fuller’s film Dead Pigeon on Beethoven Street (1972) and Kenneth Lonergan’s Margaret (2011).

• Paul recommends Samuel Fuller’s film I Shot Jesse James (1949) and Peter Brooks’ book The Melodramatic Imagination: Balzac, Henry James, Melodrama, and the Mode of Excess.

• Jason recommends Samuel Fuller’s film Shock Corridor (1963) and J. Hoberman’s book An Army of Phantoms: American Movies and the Making of the Cold War.

Check out Stephen Gillespie’s two podcasts, I’m Thinking of Spoiling Things and The STACKS, and read his reviews of films and video games at Step Printed (stepprinted.com). Find him on Letterboxd at https://letterboxd.com/stephenage/.

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To stay up to date on Cold War Cinema, follow along at coldwarcinema.com, or find us online on Bluesky @coldwarcinema.com or on X at @Cold_War_Cinema. 

For more from your hosts:

• Follow Jason on Bluesky at @JasonChristian.bsky.social, on X at @JasonAChristian, or on Letterboxed at @exilemagic. 

• Follow Anthony on Bluesky at @tonyjballas.bsky.social, on X at @tonyjballas.

• Follow Paul on Bluesky at @ptklein.com, or on Letterboxed at @ptklein. Paul also writes about movies at www.howotreadmovies.com 

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Logo by Jason Christian 

Theme music by DYAD (Charles Ballas and Jeremy Averitt). 

Happy listening!