Amazon.com Essential Video
An amazingly effective film noir action movie, shot on location in New Orleans in 1950, that has twists of plot and explosions of violence that can still make audiences gasp. Elia Kazan, of all people, directed this story of a public health worker (Richard Widmark) and a police detective (Paul Douglas) who have only a few hours in which to capture some fleeing felons who may be infected with the plague. The bad guys are played, with enormous relish, by Jack Palance and Zero Mostel, the latter only a few years before Kazan ratted him out to the House Un-American Activities Committee. In retrospect, this modest crime picture looks like a crucial turning point in the formation of Kazan's distinctive style, a clear precursor to the blistering location work of landmark films like
On the Waterfront,
Baby Doll, and
America, America.
--David Chute
Review
One of director Elia Kazan's favorite movies was this very dark tale about the bubonic plague invading New Orleans. Panic in the Streets featured a mesmerizing performance from Richard Widmark as the doctor called in to investigate a mysterious death who becomes entangled in a sinister plot. Shot in semi-documentary style by the masterful Kazan, the film applies top Hollywood production values to a bizarre original story for which Edward Anhalt and Edna Anhalt won a screenwriting Oscar. Kazan used many non-actors, shot the film entirely on location in New Orleans, and had many of the scenes done with improvised or partly improvised lines. The result is a gripping realism. Among the veterans in the lustrous cast are Barbara Bel Geddes, Zero Mostel, and Jack Palance. Kazan's loose style with actors was innovative for 1950, and he would continue to hone his direction of "method" acting in the next several years with such films as A Streetcar Named Desire, On the Waterfront, and East of Eden. ~ Michael Betzold, All Movie Guide
DVD ~ Henry Hathaway
DVD ~ Henry Hathaway
DVD ~ Karl Malden
DVD ~ William Keighley
