Your blood may run cold, but you now find yourself pinioned to the story.

Yes, absolutely, there is fun to be had, as well as many, many things to go boom, all amid an atmospheric urban jungle.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

Robert Wise directs this drama about crime in a small city. John Forsythe plays Jim Austin, a small town newspaper editor that is a crusader for all that is right, and is not afraid to fight what is wrong. A local private detective, Clyde Nelson(Hal K. Dawson), is working on a simple divorce case and uncovers something way more important. Nelson discovers a major gambling ring operating in the city. He believes that a small time mob boss Murray Sirak(Victor Sutherland) has his thumb on bookie joints that occupy almost every corner in town. Nelson brings this to Austin's attention, be doesn't put faith in the story until the detective is killed in a hit-and-run accident. Austin gets a somewhat cold shoulder when he goes to the police Chief(Ray Teal); its now up to him and his paper to rid the corruption and bring honest and respectable elements to his city. Other players: Joan Camden, Paul Brinegar, Ian Wolf and Martin Milner.

***SPOILERS*** Coming after the Senator Estes Kefarver Crime Committee hearings "Captive City" shows how organized crime reached not only into the major US cities like New York Chicago and Miami but small towns like Kennington. pop. 300,000, as well in the heart of middle America.This cancerous tumor in the American heartland was originally exposed by private detective Clyde Nelson, Hal K. Dawson, who at first didn't quite realize what he was getting himself and his wife , Geraldine Hall, into. It was Nelson's snooping around and talking too much that cost him as well as his old lady's life before the movie "Captive City" wasn't even half over! It was the local Kennington Journal editor Jim Austin, John Forsythe, who picked up the ball that Nelson dropped, by at first not heeding his warnings about police and political corruption, that finally got results. But only after a number of other people willing to testify against the criminal goings on in town ended up losing their lives like Mr. & Mrs. Nelson.Hard hitting documentary style expose that according Sen. Kefavrer himself, who's seen at the conclusion of the movie, really happened! With Jim Austin and his wife Marge, Joan Camden, running for their lives as their being chased by members of the Mafia Fabretti, Victor Romito, Mob all the way from Kennington to Washington D.C some 600 miles away! Fabretti a Miami mobster and former member of the notorious Brownsville Brooklyn Murder Inc. has taken over Kennington and installed a number of bookie joints in town who were being camouflaged behind legitimate business fronts. One of the bookie parlors was run out of insurance man Murray Sirak's, Victor Sutherland, storefront office. It was Clyde Nelson's bad luck to uncover what was going on behind the scenes at Sikak's place that had him go to the town's police chief Gillette, Ray Teal,that lead to his murder! Nelson didn't know that Chief Gillette was in on the corruption by being paid off, and in the pocket, by the Fabretti Mob.****SPOILERS**** Now on the run Jim & Marge Austin's only hope is to get to Washington D.C in time to testify against the mob that Fabrrtti is a member off in order to stay alive! That's before Fabretti's goons get them first. One of the first Hollywood movie that actually used the word "Mafia" a word that was never mentioned once in the 1972 mega mobster hit "The Godfather", that was released twenty years later, in describing the hoodlums that were trying to both undermine corrupt and finally takeover peaceful and crime free little Kennington USA. It was brave people like Clyde Nelson and later newspaper editor Jim Austin who put their lives on the line and in many cases lost them that put the likes of Fabretti with the help of the Kefarer Committee out of business and behind bars!

John Forsythe stars in this excellent crime drama directed by Robert Wise. Unlike most movies involving the mob, this one is quite a bit different, as you never actually get to see many of the crooks and the menace is much more implied than actual. This isn't bad, as it makes the film seem less predictable and more realistic.Forsythe is a newspaper owner in a small town where you'd never expect the mob. When a local private detective comes to Forstythe with stories of mobs and payoffs, the newspaperman can't believe it and only does a cursory investigation. But, when a bit later this detective is killed, Forstythe starts to wonder if there really is more to the story. Unfortunately for him, when he digs deeper, he puts his life on the line as well.Senator Kefauver (who made a name for himself crusading against organized crime) gives an epilogue in which he says the story is true. I'd really like to know more, though IMDb doesn't have any information about the case. If anyone can give me more info, I'd appreciate it.

It's strange how this Wise movie influenced "Invasion of the body snatchers".The construction is exactly the same:a car belting with a couple inside:close shots on their faces,full of fear.They take refuge in a police station,and the man begins his story which he records on a tape.Like in "body snatchers",there's a description of Kennington,a peaceful town,but little by little,the witness,a journalist, reveals us what lies beneath.And by the way,in 1945,Wise made a movie called "the body snatcher"!The town seems to be under Sirak's thumb,a local tycoon who has a hand in shady and illegal business.The police is totally corrupted,and ,it's the last analogy with "Body snatchers" ,ordinary people seem contaminated too (the car salesman),or about to be(the journalist's partner).A private eye tried to spill the beans,but he was murdered soon after having asked for the journalist's help.The murder scene is masterfully directed by Wise whose editing science is astounding:the private,driven back against a dead end street,in a symphony of black and white,by a mysterious car which will come back as an ominous messenger of death,then,abruptly,a trumpet bellowing out in a nightclub.Violence always takes place in the night,in Wise 's world (remember the end of "odds against tomorrow",or even the rumble in "west side story").The characters are realistic to a fault.No stereotype,no real baddie (except for the gangsters whom we hardly see;their presence can be felt everywhere though,that is to say how great Wise is!)It seems that Sirak is actually overtaken by events.Characters of secondary importance are wonderfully depicted:Sirak's wife,whom we see only twice in the movie appears at first as an indifferent woman,then ,a fearful,pitiful one,an alcoholic at that.The main message of the movie is that we are not helpless,as the private detective's wife told the journalist soon after her husband 's death.If the gangsters took over the town ,it's because of people (ordinary people) who are too afraid of getting mixed up in a fight against the strong and the mighty,or worse,because bribes make ends meet.In 1952,with no star,a low budget,and a great modesty,Wise showed the way to modern film noir.