The Street with No Name
| The Street with No Name | |
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Theatrical release poster
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| Directed by | William Keighley |
| Produced by | Samuel G. Engel |
| Screenplay by | Samuel G. Engel Harry Kleiner |
| Starring |
Mark Stevens Richard Widmark Lloyd Nolan Barbara Lawrence |
| Music by | Lionel Newman |
| Cinematography | Joseph MacDonald |
| Edited by | William Reynolds |
| Distributed by | Twentieth Century-Fox |
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Release date
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Running time
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91 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Box office | $2,350,000 (US rentals) |
The Street with No Name is a 1948 film noir. The movie, a follow-up to The House on 92nd Street (1945), tells the story of an undercover FBI agent, Gene Cordell (Mark Stevens), who infiltrates a deadly crime gang. Cordell's superior, FBI Inspector George A. Briggs (Lloyd Nolan), also appears in The House on 92nd Street. The movie, shot in a semidocumentary style, takes place in the Skid Row section of fictional (actually Los Angeles) "Central City."
The opening credits include the following foreword:
The motion picture you are about to see was adapted from the files of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Wherever possible, it was photographed in the original locale and played by the actual FBI personnel involved.
This is followed by a message from FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover:
The street on which crime flourishes is the street extending across America. It is the street with no name. Organized gangsterism is once again returning. If permitted to go unchecked three out of every four Americans will eventually become its victims. Wherever law and order break down there you will find public indifference. An alert and vigilant America will make for a secure America.
A crime wave, including a holdup at a nightclub that ends in a murder and a bank robbery in which a guard is killed, has hit Center City. A squad of FBI agents headed by inspector George A. Briggs meets with local FBI field officer Richard Atkins, police chief Bernard Harmatz and Police Commissioner Ralph Demory. After Briggs interrogates suspect Robert Danker, who claims he was not involved in either killing and that he has been framed, various tests are run at the FBI laboratory in Washington that exonerate Danker. Later Danker, who has been bailed out by "John Smith," is found stabbed to death. At the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia, Briggs briefs agent Gene Cordell, who is going undercover in Center City to try to infiltrate the gang Briggs thinks is responsible for all three killings. Cordell takes a bus into Center City and rents a room at the same "Skid Row" hotel in which Danker had been living. Fellow agent Cy Gordon is in a similar hotel across the street from him. Using the name George Manly, Cordell makes himself known in the area by going to the local gym and picking a fight with one of the boxers training there. He is spotted by owner Alec Stiles, who offers him cash if he can last against the boxer. He does, and Alec pays him off.
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