Crime in the Streets
Tags: violence

Plot synopsis:
After a rumble between New York City street gangs, the Hornets and Dukes, a youth is taken captive and threatened with a zip gun by Lenny Daniels, one of the Hornets. The act is witnessed by a neighbor, McAllister, who tells the cops.
Lenny is arrested and sentenced to a year in jail. Hornets leader Frankie Dane decides to get even. Seemingly incorrigible, 18-year-old Frankie resists all efforts to get through to him by social worker Ben Wagner or his worried mother, who was abandoned by Frankie's father when he was eight.
Frankie threatens McAllister, who isn't afraid of Frankie. McAllister even slaps him, then walks away. An angry Frankie then enlists friends Lou Macklin and Angelo "Baby" Gioia to assist in killing McAllister, which frightens Frankie's 10-year-old brother Richie, who overhears the plotting.
Baby's dad slaps Baby and orders, then pleads with him to stop hanging out with the no-good Frankie. An effort is made by Wagner to understand the boys rather than be angry with them, and Richie tells him of Frankie's plans to commit a murder. Wagner talks to Frankie, seemingly to no avail. The three conspirators fake going to bed, (to later use as their alibi) to wait until the agreed upon time to act. McAllister is trapped in an alley at 1:30 in the morning by the three. Richie stops his brother just-in-time, but ends up with a knife held to his throat by angry Frankie, while McAllister and other two run off, as the intended victim yells for help. Wagner appears due to the commotion, and watches as Frankie finally comes to his senses and lets his brother go. He is then accompanied by Wagner to the approaching police.

Review: 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.
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.
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.
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.
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..
"Crime In the Streets" tells the story of growing up in the slums, and what some young people will do to get out, or just to have a few kicks to help them forget their dead-end lives.
"Crime In the Streets" features some wonderful performances, especially Sal Mineo, who doesn't have enough scenes, but when he is on camera, the magic is there.
The actress who plays Frankie Dane's mother also gives an amazing, dramatic performance as the over-worked waitress, abandoned with two sons, all living in a dismal tenement apartment.
John Cassevetes is waaaaay too old to play the 18 year old delinquent, though his performance is fine.
It is depressing to witness how badly people treat each other in this film, and it is particularly disturbing to see Frankie abuse his little brother.
This and other early Sal Mineo films deserve to be re-discovered, but I don't imagine this one being re-issued any time soon.
For revenge and thrills, juvenile delinquent gang leader John Cassavetes (as Frank "Frankie" Dane) plots to kill a man.
Nail-biting Sal Mineo (as Angelo "Baby" Gioia) will lure the man into an alley, open-mouthed Mark Rydell (as Lou Macklin) will hold him down, and Mr. Cassavetes will slice and dice him to death.
Little brother Peter Votrian (as Richie Dane) overhears Cassavetes planning the murder, and tells concerned social worker James Whitmore (as Ben Wagner).
But, try as he might, Mr. Whitmore is unable to reform Cassavetes before the scheduled stabbing.The excellent script for "Crime in the Streets" was written by Reginald Rose, and had previously been seen as a live installment ABC-TV's "The Elgin Hour" (a dramatic anthology series).
The entire production is wonderfully acted; and, while Cassavetes is clearly far too old for the part, at least he gets a chance to repeat his role for film.Mineo gives the "Hornets" some youth appeal, and shows off his ability to react to other actors.
The plot is almost Shakespearian, and with the addition of music, you could imagine a certain "West Side Story" being born...********* Crime in the Streets (6/10/56) Don Siegel, Reginald Rose ~ John Cassavetes, James Whitmore, Sal Mineo, Peter Votrian.
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.
Cassavetes is pretty good in his second film credit, although he was a bit old at 26 to be playing a teen.
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..
The movie comes across as a filmed stage play as though the format hasn't changed at all.
I expect TV playwrite Reginald Rose had a lot to do with that approach, while ace action director Don Siegel simply followed out the script in uninvolved fashion.
Mineo's excellent as the reluctant delinquent, Gregg fairly oozes bread-winner exhaustion, and little Votrian can look pathetic on cue.
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.
(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..
Crime in the Streets is directed by Don Siegel and written by Reginald Rose.
It stars John Cassavetes, James Whitmore, Sal Mineo, Mark Rydell, Virginia Gregg, Peter J.
Music is scored by Franz Waxman and cinematography by Sam Leavitt.Social worker Ben Wagner (Whitmore) tries to help local slum gang, The Hornets, especially their troubled leader Frankie Dane (Cassavetes).When your body hits that sidewalk nobody will even turn around to look at yah.Decent "juve delinquent" lecture movie, Crime in the Streets boasts some mightily impressive performances and closes on a (expected) piece of dramatic worth, but the screenplay is staid and pic is claustrophobic for all the wrong reasons.
However, Cassavetes' intense firecracker performance is worth the time of any classic era film fan, and with Whitmore doing good and controlled earnest and Gregg (sadly underused) tugging away at the maternal heart strings, it still comes out in credit.
No worries whatsoever, if the basis are not that solid here ,Siegel had what it takes to left his mark and didn't need a super script to come out with an amazing films ,as he proved with the Line up or Private Hell 36.
He was probably charged with the task of making a teenage movie in the vein of the Blackboard Jungle ,same as he was probably assigned to do in Riot in Block cell 11 .In both cases he managed to succeed though working under disadvantageous circumstances: low budget , unoriginal plots with a moralistic tone which allows to see the what would be the end from minute one .
Crime in the streets also had some clichés about juvenile delinquency.But Siegel overcame aany inconveniences to provide a more than decent outcome .
Characters are solid and well constructed, Cassavettes is very convincing as the leader of the gang and action flows smoothly , helped by the sense of realism that the director gives to the film, so overall not bad at all.
Their leader is Frankie (John Cassavetes), a super-angry dude who lives with his whiny mom and little brother in a cheap, squalid apartment overlooking the street.
And an adult social worker and the father of one of the gang members dish out lots of paternalistic advice to Frankie and his buddies.High-contrast B&W lighting is probably the best element of the film.
As Frankie's mom, Virginia Gregg gives an especially nice performance.It's not a bad movie.
If the viewer likes stage plays with some good acting, "Crime In The Streets" is a pretty good 1950s juvenile delinquency film..
Discovering that a disenfranchised local youth is planning a revenge murder, an altruistic social worker desperately tries to prevent the crime without police intervention in this juvenile delinquency drama directed by Don Siegel.
The film is not particularly subtle with its agenda as lead actor James Whitmore bluntly states such truisms as "you can't tell a kid to be good" and as all parents find themselves exasperated by their kids in the most melodramatic manner possible.
The film features a phenomenal early turn by John Cassavetes though as the youth planning the murder with lots of subtle nuances whenever he listens to Whitmore lecture and as he plays on the fears of his friends.
The film also opens with a deathly intense pre-credits scene as good as anything Siegel ever directed.
The dialog has verisimilitude and the Film feels authentic beneath the facade, but as Movie Entertainment it could have opened up a bit, but the limited budget and Studio bound sets were not accommodating.
Don Siegel directed this socially aware drama that stars James Whitmore as a local social worker doing his best to educate and dissuade the youth to not turn to a life of crime, and join a gang.
Sal Mineo and Mark Rydell play followers of his, who get entangled in the revenge plot that Whitmore desperately tries to prevent, before lives are lost or futures ruined.
There were a rash of films about angry, mean teens: Rebel without a Cause, Blackboard Jungle, So Young, So Bad, High School Confidential, Blue Denim, etc., etc.
But JD became a big topic.This film, "Crime in the Streets," from 1956, is a low-budget, black and white movie about a bunch of mean kids in a bad neighborhood.
The film's titular star was James Whitmore as a social worker running a community center.
But "Crime in the Streets" "introduced" a mainly TV actor, John Cassavetes.
The film also features Sal Mineo, future director Mark Rydell, Virginia Gregg, and Denise Alexander, who has appeared on General Hospital on and off for the past 38 years.
Here's she's a teenager.The story focuses in on one family, the Danes, which includes Frankie (Cassavetes), his little brother Richie, and their mom (Gregg).
He's incredibly angry and at one point, he plans to kill a neighbor he hates and tries to get his friends to come along with him.This is pretty dreary stuff that looks like an old TV show, done on a sound stage.
CRIME IN THE STREETS is so obviously a message picture that's it's almost painfully didactic in spots, a less-than-classic "Juvenile Delinquent" opus.
The worst element is the social worker (James Whitmore_ who tries so desperately to change a clearly deeply disturbed, would-be psychopath Frankie (Cassavetes) with useless talk.
Cassavetes has his moments too, but his method style is often distracting and he's clearly too old for the typical 1950s "Juvenile Delinquent" part, despite his boyish looks and short stature.
But it's Sal Mineo as Kuluva's son, "Baby" who gives the film's truest and most realized performance.
Don Siegel directed "Crime in the Streets".
John Cassavetes is the lead and James Whitmore and Sal Mineo are in support.
Even Sam Pekinpah gets a screen credit, though under an altered name.Yet everything about this story of a gang of 1950s delinquents seems mediocre -- dated, talky, preachy, and overdone.The director of Rose's "Twelve Angry Men" set the story in a closed jury room and never tried opening it up.
James Whitmore is always reliable, and John Cassavetes gets to bring his method intensity to the part of a half-crazed delinquent.
Now Lenny and his boys were going to do the same thing to the captured Duke street gang member.It was too bad for Lenny that concerned citizen Mr. Mcallister caught him in the act of pulling a zip-gun and reported Lenny to the police.
And this comes to the attention of neighborhood social worker Ben Wagner through Frankie's kid brother Richie who overheard his plan and wants to keep him from carrying it out.
As well as, if he succeeds, prevent his big brother Frankie from ending up being strapped into Sing Sing's electric chair!Following the success of troubled teenage movies like "The Blackboard Jungle" and "Rebel Without a Cause" the previous year it was a given that they'll be followed with a film like "Crime in the Streets" that actually preceded, on TV, both of them.
Even though he was a bit old, at age 27, to play an 18 year old John Cassavetes was very convincing as the misguided and troubled Frankie Dane.
There's also the sensitive and confused Angelo Baby Giola played by 16 year old Sal Mineo.
But when it comes to do in Mr. Macllister the poor kid reaches his breaking point!***SPOILERS*** As for Crazy Louie, played by Mark Rydell, he's by far the craziest of the bunch in having no morals at all in murdering someone which even the not so stable Frankie, who planned Mr. Macllister's murder, later has second thought about!
The real heroes in the movie is Frankie's kid brother Richie, Peter J.
Votrian, and social worker Ben Wagner, James Whitmore, who in the end put Frankie straight in seeing that his hatred for the world at large, in putting him in the mess that he finds himself in, was more of his own making and one one else's!
And, like most of these films, the 'teens' in this film are mostly actors in their twenties and even thirties, though a few (Sal Mineo) were actually teens.John Cassavetes plays the nominal leader of a gang of incredibly clean-cut looking punks.
In the meantime, an incredibly earnest social worker (James Whitmore) comes on VERY strong and tries to point the guys in the right direction before it's too late.
While there are a few qualities similar to noir, a teenage delinquent film with a crusading social worker sounds nothing like noir!
BUT, the film still has something to offer--John Cassavetes strong performance.
He IS the film and helps to make up for the writing deficiencies (particularly Whitmore's character who just comes on a bit too strong at times--though he did have some good scenes--especially towards the end).
There are a few other nice performances in the film as well (such as Will Kuluva, Mark Rydell, Virginia Gregg and Atterbury)--and this help the film to rise above the mediocrity of most delinquent teen films.
The sociology of all sociological films is this 1956 excellent view of urban life, filled with social problems and the rise of gangs and ensuing violence.
It's an absolutely wonderful film.John Cassavetes, as Frankie, the boy craving attention, is just fabulous here and Sal Mineo, always good, especially when he is a follower and conflicted, is hesitant in going along with Frankie's plans to rub out an elderly man who blew the whistle on their friend.
He is absolutely demented and actually enjoys what the trio plan to do.James Whitmore is the social worker here who knows that Frankie and the guys are up to no good.There is a wonderful performance by Virginia Gregg as Frankie's exhausted, over-worked waitress mother, who knows that she can't control him but pleads with him.
Ditto for the gentleman who played the Italian father of Mineo.The film, though extremely liberally slanted, provides an excellent view of urban decay and the rise of juvenile delinquency as a result.
From the moment you see street thugs (John Cassavettes, Mark Rydell and Sal Mineo to mention a few), you can feel the anger pouring from the streets and onto the screen.
James Whitmore, as the local social worker determined to help the boys as much as he can, is like a substitute father figure, and even though they won't admit it, the young men respect him.
When it comes apparent that Cassavettes is planning revenge, it's up to Whitmore to step in before it's too late.These kids aren't living the middle class life of the rebels without a cause of that 1955 James Dean/Sal Mineo/Natalie Wood classic.
One key scene has Mineo in a confrontation with his worried father (Will Kuluva) who actually acts more like an overprotective mother in his display of love for his son.
Soap vet Denise Alexander plays Mineo's sister who is tired of the violence and also tries to get through to Cassavettes.This film gives a really mean looking portrayal of the life of these kids.
My only real issue with the film was the sterilized ending which doesn't really complete the story, but takes it into a new direction the audience doesn't get to see..
Cassavetes is all sub-Brando method acting, but Sal Mineo is bit more with-it than usual.Nonetheless, the only really impressive performance is offered by Mark Rydell.