the audience applauded

Excellent but underrated film

It's complicated... I really like the directing, acting and writing but, there are issues with the way it's shot that I just can't deny. As much as I love the storytelling and the fantastic performance but, there are also certain scenes that didn't need to exist.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

Anthony Quinn was quite good here as a mobster who is overly involved with his family. Through threats, intimidation, corruption and who knows what else, Quinn is able to spring Farley Granger, on death row, for a murder that the latter committed. This showed how corrupt the justice system is and furthermore how he could be manipulated to suit the needs of the guilty.Quinn does this so that Granger can marry the former's sister who is in trouble from the Granger family.The marriage sours and Quinn decides to destroy Granger and the frame ultimately destroys the two men.Anne Bancroft gives a toned down but compelling performance as the sister who finally comes to see what her brother really is all about.

Anthony Quinn stars in "The Naked Street," a 1955 film with Farley Granger, Anne Bancroft, and Peter Graves.Quinn plays a gangster, Phil Regal, whose sister Rosalie (Bancroft) is pregnant and unmarried. Nowadays, this would be a cause for celebration. Back then, it was a scandal. The father is Nicky Bradna (Granger) who is at the moment on death row for killing a liquor store owner while he was stealing his money.Regal is a wonderful son to his mother (Else Baeck) and a protective brother, but he's basically involved in lots of illegal activities.Phil wants Nicky to marry Rosalie, so he drops bundles of cash in the right places. Suddenly the witnesses have second thoughts about what they saw and the DA is willing to give him another trial. Soon he's out, married to Rosalie, and driving a truck, which is not what he wanted to do. But big brother insisted.It doesn't take Nicky long to start acting up - he and Rosalie suffer a tragedy, he doesn't like his job, and Regal wants him out of the way.Pretty good noir, and Anthony Quinn does a wonderful job showing us the human being beneath the tough gangster. Anne Bancroft is very young, but excellent in her part, and Farley Granger does well as the loser husband."The Naked Street" is a derivative story, so it's not particularly special, but it is worth a look.

Anthony Quinn is a mob boss, his sister Anne Bancroft is pregnant by her cheap thug boyfriend Farley Granger who is on death row for killing a liquor store owner, she lives a home with their sweet mom. When Quinn finds out Granger is Bancroft's father he arranges to get Granger sprung and free by strong-arming and intimidation. So Granger and Bancroft get married but the baby dies at birth and Granger snaps and starts fooling around and resents Quinn. Quinn decides Granger is no longer necessary so he has him set-up and framed for the murder of Lee Van Cleef. Granger is now on death row again so he confesses to the first murder of the liquor store guy so the D.A. will prosecute Quinn for getting him off in the first place. Pretty soon things get tense and the cops come for Quinn. He runs to the roof of his old building and tries to jump the 8 feet between buildings, he makes the jump but teeters and grabs a TV antenna to right himself. The whole time, Peter Graves is the crusading newspaper reporter weaving in and out of the story and narrating the flick. This is a so-so crime drama with everything including the chubby short foreign accent mother cooking Sunday dinner, Quinn's goons working people over, floozy girl friends, street wise upbringing stories and pigeons on the roof. Not really formula but not spectacular. Entertaining enough for an hour and a half.

This film is a film noir wannabe and just doesn't quite make it. The plot, a mobster (Quinn) who holds his family as a icon of decency, discovers his sister (Bancroft) is "jammed up" by a local neighborhood playboy (Granger) who is on death row for murder. Bringing his influence to bear, the gangster gets the playboy a new trail and his freedom so he can marry his sister. But, the playboy can't stand it and gets caught by the hood stepping out on his wife. So, the gangster sets his roving brother-in-law up to be framed for murder. But, as his playboy son-in-law tells him, "I didn't kill this guy but I did kill the first one..." and the cops use him to chase the hood to his death while his mother is bringing him a bottle of seltzer water to have with his weekly dinner with her.Film buffs will enjoy seeing the younger Quinn in scowling action as well as Granger and Bancroft in their younger days. The acting is solid, the storyline somewhat pedestrian and there's no video or DVD. You'll have to catch on the late show.