The other newcomer was another ’50s TV stalwart, Gene Barry, a year before he headlined George Pal’s “War of the Worlds” (his final screen appearance was a cameo in Spielberg’s 2005 remake).
Reviews in 1952 praised the auspicious directing debut of Jerry Hopper, a former film editor, who directed a number of above-average programmers (including “Nothing But the Truth” with Forsythe as another newspaperman who helps young Tim Hovey expose civic corruption) before seguing to a prolific career in episodic television. “The Atomic City,” a Paramount release making its DVD debut next month in an excellent transfer under a licensing agreement Olive Films, is noir that, because of its title, often got lumped in with sci-fi titles on DVD in TV syndication packages back in the ’60s. The solidly entertaining “The Captive City” is among a steady stream of noirs originally released by United Artists that have been made available through the MGM Limited Edition Collection for manufactured-on-demand DVDs. Cinematographer Lee Garmes enhanced extensive location shooting by using a special lens that provides ultra-deep focus even in low light, co-developed by Gregg Toland.
Kefauver, whose real-life hearings made him a national figure and drew large audiences, liked the movie so much he agreed to write a forward and deliver a speech as an epilogue, as well as endorsing the film in advertisements. The organized crime figures decide to try and stop Forsythe. Our hero decides to testify before a televised Congressional hearing into organized crime chaired by Sen.
Particularly interesting are the pressures - a threat to withdraw advertising or provide lots of it to the struggling paper if certain subjects are avoided - brought on Forsythe’s business partner, who begins wavering. After a staff photographer (Martin Milner) gets beaten up after taking a picture of a Mafioso from Florida in town, he decides to begin a crusade in print. turns up dead, our hero isn’t satisfied with the responses of the oily police chief (Ray Teal). before going off to fight World War II, which was followed by a spell on Broadway).Īt first, Forsythe shrug off suggestions by a middle-private investigator that his fictional city (it was, like “Violent Saturday,” filmed mostly in Reno) where the Mafia has infilitrated a bookie operation long run by a local real-estate agent. This time the newspaperman is a stalwart hero played by John Forsythe in his first Hollywood leading role (he had a couple of bits at Warner Bros. “The Captive City,” a low-budget flick from Wise and Mark Robson’s short-lived indie production company, is one of the best newspapers noirs I’ve seen, if not quite in a league with Billy Wilder’s dipped-in-battery-acid cynical “Ace in the Hole” from the year before.