The Rose City shows off its thorns in this hard-hitting, pseudo-documentary film noir so damning of corruption that most Pacific Northwest theaters controversially refused to show it. "Vice threatened to inundate this beautiful city," intones a narrator over an opening montage of Portland’s greenery and architecture. "The events you are about to see happened here and they could happen again… in your town." An innocent tavern owner is forced to turn his business into a hoodlum nightspot after thugs threaten his family. Only turning undercover for the Feds will give him any chance at stopping an onrushing tide of drugs, gambling and prostitution. The film was based on a real-life 1957 Senate investigation into a Portland syndicate; after the film was released, over twenty area exhibitors refused to screen the film, citing pressure from "interested parties." - Jason Sanders
