As the film opens, two thugs kill another thug. When the body is discovered and about to be autopsied, the doctor realizes that although the man was shot dead, he was also suffering from the Pneumonic plague--a very nasty and more virulent version of the Bubonic plague! So, it's a race against time to find those who came in contact with the dead man and treat them immediately, otherwise a disaster could erupt.

Oddly, I actually know quite a bit about the Pneumonic plague, as I taught a series of lectures on it for my history classes. The film really did not do a good job of getting the facts right about the disease in that it looked little like what the people had in the movie. The biggest problem is that this illness is so incredibly grotesque that in 1950 they really wouldn't have been allowed to show it. Sure, there is high fever and coughing (they got this right) but also lots of bleeding and explosive vomiting of blackened blood--along with the enormously swollen lymph nodes like you'd get with the Bubonic plague--all purply and gross! I can certainly understand why they didn't go this far. Also, I am sure that the federal government would have had a much, much greater involvement in controlling and treating the disease--here in the film it was handled on a very local level and everyone seemed ill-prepared and a bit dumb. No one seemed willing to believe the doctors!! As for the acting, the film had some excellent actors here. Richard Widmark and Paul Douglas are, respectively, the public health doctor and police chief. Good actors but also known actors back in 1950. However, in his first film is the very menacing Jack Palance (still going by his original moniker, 'Walter Jack Palance') as well as the relatively unknown (at the time) Zero Mostel. Palance was great--very scary and very physically adept in his own stunts. Mostel played a heavy typical of his early work--a greasy and cowardly sort of evil.

Overall, despite really not getting the details right and wrapping everything up a little too neatly, the film is very tense and has excellent acting--and is well worth seeing.

Elia Kazan is not at his best here; East of Eden, Splendor in the Grass, A Streetcar Named Desire and especially On the Waterfront are superior films. Panic in the Streets is still a very good, often excellent even, film and is very much an under-appreciated effort from him.

Panic in the Streets visually is not as audacious as the aforementioned films, it's not a bad-looking film at all actually as it's nicely shot and atmospherically lit but sometimes the lower budget does show in some less-than-taut editing. It also has some slightly draggy stretches in the middle and as a result of a lot going on the film occasionally feels over-stuffed.

Kazan's direction impresses though, first thoughts was that it was an unusual choice of film for him to take on, but he still directs with his usual class and tension and some of the themes here not at all unlike some of those of his other films(i.e Gentlemen's Agreement). Alfred Newman's often exciting, always atmosphere-enhancing music score compliments the film beautifully, and all the characters are very well-written and believable, Blackie for me especially was a very interesting character. It's the script, story and acting where Panic in the Streets most strongly excels however.

The script boasts some truly cracking dialogue, with some witty exchanges ("You know, my mother always told me if you looked deep enough in anybody, you always find some good, but I don't know"/" With apologies to your mother, that's the second mistake she made") and a lot of tension, tension so strong sometimes that one might find themselves with significantly shorter nails by the end of the film from biting. There is a lot going on in the story, occasionally it feels over-stuffed, but it's compellingly paced, all the different plot strands are handled with no less detail than the one before it, it's very focused and doesn't focus too much on one thing and completely under-develop another, and even with a lot going on it didn't feel confusing, a lot of effort actually is made into making the storytelling as clear as possible and it is always tense and exciting. Panic in the Streets contains some really powerful acting, with Richard Widmark- in a good guy role- giving one of his most restrained performances, and it is hard to believe that this was only Jack Palance's film debut, he's spine-chilling here in a performance that to me ranks among his better ones. Paul Douglas, Barbara Bel Geddes and Zero Mostel don't play any less compellingly, Douglas contrasts very likeably with Widmark, Bel Geddes is very touching and Mostel is amusing and creepy while wisely reigning in in a role that he could have easily over-acted.

Overall, not one of Kazan's best but a very good, and often excellent, film, that is very much under-appreciated. 8/10 Bethany Cox

In Panic In The Streets Richard Widmark plays U.S. Navy doctor who has his week rudely interrupted with a corpse that contains plague. As cop Paul Douglas properly points out the guy died from two bullets in the chest. That's not the issue here, the two of them become unwilling partners in an effort to find the killers and anyone else exposed to the disease.

As was pointed out by any number of people, for some reason director Elia Kazan did not bother to cast the small parts with anyone that sounds like they're from Louisiana. Having been to New Orleans where the story takes place I can personally attest to that. Richard Widmark and his wife Barbara Bel Geddes can be excused because as a Navy doctor he could be assigned there, but for those that are natives it doesn't work.

But with plague out there and the news being kept a secret, the New Orleans PD starts a dragnet of the city's underworld. The dead guy came off a ship from Europe and he had underworld connections. A New Orleans wise guy played by Jack Palance jumps to a whole bunch of erroneous conclusions and starts harassing a cousin of the dead guy who is starting to show plague symptoms. Palance got rave reviews in the first film where he received notice.

Personally my favorite in this film is Zero Mostel. This happened right before Mostel was blacklisted and around that time he made a specialty of playing would be tough guys who are really toadies. He plays the same kind of role in the Humphrey Bogart film, The Enforcer. Sadly I can kind of identify with Mostel in that last chase scene where he and Palance are being chased down by Widmark, Douglas, and half the New Orleans Police. Seeing the weight challenged Zero trying to keep up with Palance was something else because I'm kind of in Zero's league now in the heft department.

Kazan kept the action going at a good clip, there's very little down time in this film. If there was any less it would be an Indiana Jones film. Panic In The Streets won an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay that year.

Kazan also made good use of the New Orleans waterfront and the French Quarter. Some of the same kinds of shots are later used in On the Waterfront. In fact Panic In The Streets is about people not squealing when they really should in their own best interest. Very similar again to On the Waterfront.

Panic In The Streets does everyone proud who was associated with it. Now why couldn't Elia Kazan get some decent New Orleans sounding people in the small roles.