“Filmed in Portland… But Now Banned in Portland!” (9/18/1957) Movie poster for the cheesy low-budget crime potboiler “Portland Exposé”, which was filmed here and based loosely on a recent organized crime scandal that made for rather embarrassing national headlines.
The city’s experience with the film started off innocently enough; a March 13, 1957 article “Quiz of Rackets Basis of Movie” started off by marveling that Hollywood had discovered Portland. It mentions that some filming would take place in town, and the studio was trying to land someone named Barry Sullivan to star in the thing. Apparently that didn’t work out, as the immortal Ed Binns ended up with top billing. On April 5th, the paper published a photo of movie folks scouting locations, and a production photo appeared on June 6th, with cast and crew taking a break outside the old municipal auditorium. An April 6th blurb offered assurances from the screenwriter that the city would be shown as a “decent” place, and not the “sin city” the national media had made it out to be.
The first sign of trouble came on July 24th, seemingly out of nowhere, in a small item under “Wednesday Radio Highlights”, which read “4:30 PM (KGON) - Frank Faro interviews Portlanders for opinions on proposed banning of movie “Portland Exposé”. Clearly there was more of a controversy going on than the Oregonian elected to cover.
On August 8th, an article appeared titled “Portland Ban on ‘Expose’ Film Denied”. It seems that the filmmakers elected not to hold the grand world premiere here, causing a rumor that the film had been banned here. On the other hand, the article points out that the local distributor had decided on his own not to exhibit the movie here, citing its “controversial nature” and the fact that many court cases from the real-life scandal were still pending. So long story short, locals wouldn’t be able to see it, but technically it wasn’t the government’s doing. (Portland had mostly gotten out of the film censorship business in 1950 after a furor over the art film “The Bicycle Thief”.) In any case, the subtleties were lost on (or ignored by) the nation’s B-movie promoters, who saw dollar signs and ran with “banned”, as in the movie poster above.
Aaaand, that’s the last we hear of the film until October 2nd, when the paper’s DC correspondent noted with some satisfaction that “Empty Seats End ‘Portland Expose’ Run in Washington”, going on to point out how cheap and badly made the film was, and quoting some of the film’s poor reviews. So here’s at least one case where notoriety wasn’t quite a license to print money. In fairness, movies being banned in various places was pretty common back in 1957, so maybe moviegoers had gotten jaded about that. Dunno.
In any case, the film appears one more time in the paper’s archives, on 9/15/1983, when the Northwest Film Center finally gave “Portland Exposé” its local premiere, 26 years late. Ted Mahar spends much of the article pointing out that it’s a really crappy movie, only worth watching for the camp value, comparing it to the low-budget sci-fi and horror movies of the era. Which, if you’ve ever seen the film, is actually kind of an insult to 50s sci-fi and horror movies. The movie seems to have vanished from YouTube, but the trailer’s still available here, if you’re curious. It’s also out on DVD, if you’re still into the whole physical media thing.
![“Architect’s Drawing of One of Four Proposed Public Rest Rooms is Completed”, Feb. 15th, 1920. The drawing is barely legible in this reproduction, but it shows the still-extant pair of “comfort stations” in Ankeny Park, the southernmost North Park Block [link goes to an old 2006 blog post I did about the park]. The buildings have been closed for a couple of years, after the opening of the shiny new “Portland Loo” a few blocks north of here. The city’s supposedly going to redesign this block someday, if they find the money, and at that point I expect they’re going to demolish these old buildings. I mean, I don’t really see how you could turn them into a McMenamins or anything. I do hope they keep or reuse the funky little double-sided fountain between the two buildings, at least.
The full text of the caption reads:
Plans have been completed by Park Superintendent Keyser for beginning construction of the first of three proposed comfort stations in the downtown area. The plans for this rest station on Park, West Park, Ankeny and Burnside streets have been completed, and it is expected that work will begin within a few weeks. Tentative estimates place the cost of the building at approximately $25,000.
The city council has virtually decided to build another comfort station at Broadway and Stark street; another at Third and Alder, and the fourth, if built, will be at West Park and Alder streets.
The city officials ope to have the comfort stations completed before the convention season in June, and hence the contracts for the work will be let within the next ten days, it is announced.
As far as I can tell, the other proposed stations were never built.
The thing that always surprises me is how quickly the city used to move when it decided to do something. Today we’d have years of architects and designers and assorted “stakeholders” wringing their hands, and public hearings, visioning processes, group therapy sessions, and so on, and so forth. In 1920, though, they hired an architect in late January, had buildable plans in hand less than a month later, and were ready to bid the construction contract. Granted the end result has been a big public nuisance and eyesore for much of the last century, but still, it’s kind of amazing how quickly they put it together.
Other things haven’t changed a bit. By October of 1921, the city council was debating deep cuts in the city parks budget, and the growing “comfort station” line item was singled out for criticism. Based on their current condition you wouldn’t think the city had spent any money at all on them after building them, but apparently there were actual washroom attendants at one point.
Numbering among the stranger proposed budget cuts, city commissioners also voted to eliminate gold and silver medals awarded to sharpshooters, along with some semaphore platforms the city was thinking about building. The commission also considered cutting funds to replace the linoleum floor in the city auditor’s office, but relented after inspecting the existing floor and seeing what bad shape it was in. Which I guess is yet another glamorous part of being an elected city official. Or something.](http://24.media.tumblr.com/4d7c07e6c0c144405654a7ec53ffc3c5/tumblr_mkpy1czYhD1r2qob0o1_500.png)
