Pickup on South Street

Pickup on South Street is a 1953 American film noir about a pickpocket who unwittingly lifts a message destined for enemy agents and becomes a target for a Communist spy ring.
 * Directed and written by Samuel Fuller.

How the law took a chance on a B-girl... and won!

Skip McCoy

 * [after first kiss with Candy] Sometimes you look for oil, you hit a gusher.
 * I know you pinched me three times and got me convicted three times and made me a three time loser. And I know you took an oath to put me away for life. Well you're trying awful hard with all this patriotic eye-wash, but get this: I didn't grift that film and you can't prove I did! And if I said I did, you'd slap that fourth rap across my teeth no matter what promises you made!
 * So you're a Red, who cares? Your money's as good as anybody else's.
 * [to Capt. Tiger] You're sittin' on a hot rock. I'd like to see you jump!

Moe Williams

 * Listen, Mister. When I come in here tonight, you seen an old clock runnin' down. I'm tired. I'm through. Happens to everybody sometime. It'll happen to you too, someday. With me it's a little bit of everything. Backaches and headaches. I can't sleep nights. It's so hard to get up in the morning, and get dressed and walk the streets. Climb the stairs. I go right on doin' it! Well, what am I gonna do, knock it? I have to go on makin' a livin'... so I can die. But even a fancy funeral ain't worth waitin' fer if I gotta do bus'ness with crumbs like you.
 * Ask a silly question, you get a dopey look.

Other

 * Capt. Dan Tiger: You'll always be a two-bit cannon. And when they pick you up in the gutter dead, you're hand'll be in a drunk's pocket.

Dialogue

 * Moe Williams: You got any Happy Money?
 * Candy: Happy Money?
 * Moe Williams: Yeah, money that's gonna make me happy.


 * Moe Williams: What's the matter with you? Playing footsie with the Commies!
 * Skip McCoy: You waving the flag, too?
 * Moe Williams: Listen, I knew you since you was a little kid. You was always a regular kind of crook. I never figured you for a louse.
 * Skip McCoy: Stop, you're breaking my heart.
 * Moe Williams: Even in our crummy line of business you gotta draw the line somewhere.


 * Skip McCoy: You boys are talking to the wrong corner. I'm just a guy keeping my hands in my own pockets.
 * FBI Agent Zara: If you refuse to cooperate you'll be as guilty as the traitors who gave Stalin the A-bomb.
 * Skip McCoy: Are you waving the flag at me?


 * Skip McCoy: Pack up the pitch with the charge or drive me back to my shack.
 * Capt. Dan Tiger: I'll drive you back in a hearse if you don't get the kink out of your mouth!


 * Candy: You've been recommended as the best pickpocket stoolie in the business.
 * Moe Williams: What kind of talk is that, calling me a stoolie? I was brought up to report any injustice to the police authority. I call that being a solid citizen.
 * Candy: But you get paid for it.
 * Moe Williams: You gonna knock it?


 * Moe Williams: I've got almost enough to buy both the stone and the plot.
 * Capt. Dan Tiger: If you lost that kitty, it's Potter's Field.
 * Moe Williams: This I do not think is a very funny joke, Captain Tiger!
 * Capt. Dan Tiger: I just meant you ought to be careful how you carry your bankroll.
 * Moe Williams: Look, Tiger, if I was to be buried in Potter's Field, it would just about kill me.


 * Joey: You'd sell anybody for buttons.
 * Moe Williams: Yeah, but not to you, Mister!

Cast

 * Richard Widmark - Skip McCoy
 * Jean Peters - Candy
 * Thelma Ritter - Moe Williams
 * Murvyn Vye - Captain Dan Tiger
 * Richard Kiley - Joey
 * Willis Bouchey - Zara
 * Milburn Stone - Winoki
 * Parley Baer - Headquarters Communist in Chair
 * George E. Stone - Willie - Police Desk Clerk
 * Stuart Randall - Detective