Kick-Back Friday: #143

Deciphering the city location of Union Station (1950)—a pleasurable, but otherwise pedestrian thriller starring William Holden, Nancy Olsen, and Barry Fitzgerald—is probably more entertaining than following the kidnapping plot of a rich blind girl. The hub of action, the titular train depot, is clearly Los Angeles; but the peripheral locations—an urban stockyard, an elevated train, and the "Municipal Tunnel"—scream Chicago. It's no help that the Windy City has its own very famous Union Station (The Untouchables [1987], anyone?). The tossed-in fictional addresses (eg, 21st and Mulberry) provide no direction whatsoever.

Poster for Union Station, from Wikipedia, reproduced under fair use law.