Bernie Smith, Donald Brittain
This film is a revealing portrait of a tough cop with a big heart. Sergeant Bernie "Whistling" Smith walks the beat on Vancouver's Eastside, the hangout of petty criminals, down-and-outs and a variety of characters. His policing is unorthodox. To many drug users, petty thieves and prostitutes in this economically depressed area he is more than the iron hand of the law, he is also a counsellor and a friend.
Almost fifty years later, this is still quite an interesting look at the much more hands-on approach to urban policing taken by Sgt. Bernie Smith. He prefers to walk the beat of his central Vancouver district and apparently acts as a significant deterrent to the street crime that prevails. Mostly hookers and drug addicts - vanilla essence is the drug du jour! His methods are at best unorthodox, an...