Who would have dreamt of casting Edward Binns as a superhero? The fine character actor is the image of an ordinary, square citizen, but in Allied Artists' entertaining exploitation movie Portland Expose, he is not only a guy who stands up against the mob but signed handedly, defeats an extremely powerful criminal organization that has expanded from Seattle to take over Portland, just because they tried to open up his little local tavern to pinball machines and slot machines (with plans for "opening it up" to drugs and prostitution down the line.
His acting is fine, but early on I couldn't buy the notion that Binns would repeatedly risk his life (and significantly the lives of his nuclear family) over and over again with even a hint of fear. We can imagine Joe Don Baker or more recently The Rock taking on all comers without batting an eye (though Dwayne Johnson would certainly raise an eyebrow), but Binns' courage, however enviable, isn't believable.
A highlight comes early in the movie when mob thug Frank Gorshin is terrific, not imitating any of his screen heroes (Lancaster, Widmark) but being highly original as a pervert who really digs young girls and violently assaults Binns' teenage daughter Carolyn Craig with rape in mind. He later gets to save Carolyn again when higher-ups in the mob are about to throw acid in her face to get papa to reveal where he's hidden incriminating audio tapes that are evidence of their wrongdoing.
It's a fine little movie, which significantly emphasizes the infiltration of organized crime into labor unions (e.g., Hoffa).
His acting is fine, but early on I couldn't buy the notion that Binns would repeatedly risk his life (and significantly the lives of his nuclear family) over and over again with even a hint of fear. We can imagine Joe Don Baker or more recently The Rock taking on all comers without batting an eye (though Dwayne Johnson would certainly raise an eyebrow), but Binns' courage, however enviable, isn't believable.
A highlight comes early in the movie when mob thug Frank Gorshin is terrific, not imitating any of his screen heroes (Lancaster, Widmark) but being highly original as a pervert who really digs young girls and violently assaults Binns' teenage daughter Carolyn Craig with rape in mind. He later gets to save Carolyn again when higher-ups in the mob are about to throw acid in her face to get papa to reveal where he's hidden incriminating audio tapes that are evidence of their wrongdoing.
It's a fine little movie, which significantly emphasizes the infiltration of organized crime into labor unions (e.g., Hoffa).