A Lion Is in the Streets
| A Lion Is in the Streets | |
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| Directed by | Raoul Walsh |
| Produced by | William Cagney |
| Written by |
Luther Davis Andria Locke Langley (novel) |
| Starring |
James Cagney Barbara Hale |
| Music by | Franz Waxman |
| Cinematography | Harry Stradling |
| Edited by | George Amy |
| Distributed by | Warner Bros. |
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Release date
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Running time
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88 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
A Lion Is in the Streets is a 1953 drama film directed by Raoul Walsh and starring James Cagney as a southern politician loosely based on Huey Long. Cagney's brother William was the producer, while his younger sister Jeanne was a member of the cast. The screenplay was based on a 1945 book by Adria Locke Langley. The film is compared to the similar 1949 film All the King's Men, featuring Broderick Crawford in an Academy Award-winning performance.
Charismatic roving peddler Hank Martin (James Cagney) falls in love at first sight with schoolteacher Verity Wade (Barbara Hale) and soon marries her. On their wedding day, he rents a ramshackle home from his upper class lawyer friend Jules Bolduc (Warner Anderson). Hank rounds up some of his many friends to fix up the place, but Verity begins to realize that he is not as nice as he appears to be; while they do the work, he sees nothing wrong in going inside to read a law book. He confides to her that it is all a matter of manipulating people the right way.
Jules invites the couple to dine with him that night, but Hank soon quarrels with another guest, Robert L. Castlebury IV (Larry Keating). He accuses Castlebury, the owner of the company that buys cotton, of shortchanging the poor farmers.
When Hank goes about his business, Verity accompanies him to the bayou. A young woman named Flamingo (Anne Francis) leaps into his arms, but when she learns that he is now married, she tries to arrange for an alligator to rid her of her rival. Verity is only injured. However, Flamingo does not give up on the man she has loved since she was a teen. After Hank sends Verity home to recover, Flamingo tracks Hank down on the road. She overcomes his resistance, and they start an affair.
Hank sets out to prove that Castlebury is cheating. When Hank proves that the weights used are seriously inaccurate, one of Castlebury's men aims a rifle at one of Hank's followers, and is killed by farmer Jeb Brown (John McIntyre).
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Wikipedia