“Let me mix you a martini that’s pure magic. It may not make one’s problems disappear, but… it does reduce their size”.
Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin in SOME CAME RUNNING (1958) will be available on Blu-ray November 16th from Warner Archive
After a round of partying he can’t remember, World War II veteran Dave Hirsh is placed on a bus headed for the last place he’d choose Parkman, Indiana, the hometown Hirsh hasn’t seen in well over decade. Frank Sinatra plays Hirsh, whose arrival in Parkman brings small-town hypocrisy to the unforgiving light of day in this character-driven tale directed by Vincente Minnelli and based on a novel by James Jones (whose From Here to Eternity led to Sinatra’s 1953 Oscar). In his first screen pairing with Sinatra, Dean Martin plays a sharp-witted card sharp. And Shirley MacLaine earned one of the movie’s five Academy Award® nominations as the good-hearted floozy with a potentially fatal attraction to Hirsh.
Special Features: Featurette: “The Story of SOME CAME RUNNING”, Original Theatrical Trailer (HD)
“Fast worker, that boy. He just met her and he’s rounding third.”
Frank Sinatra and Gene Kelly in TAKE ME OUT TO THE BALLGAME (1949) will be available on Blu-ray July 20th from Warner Archive. Ordering information can be found HERE.
Whether its Batter up! or Curtain Up!, Frank Sinatra and Gene Kelly are ready when they play early-1900s 1900s vaudevillians who spend the winter performing onstage and the summer performing on the field.
The Wolves baseball team gets steamed when they find they’ve been inherited by one K.C. Higgins, a suspected “fathead” who intends to take an active interest in running the team. But K.C. turns outs to be a beautiful woman who really knows her baseball. Second baseman Dennis Ryan promptly falls in love. But his playboy roommate Eddie O’Brien has his own notions about how to treat the new lady owner and some unsavory gamblers have their own ideas about how to handle Eddie.
Great new for Frank Sinatra fans. NONE BUT THE BRAVE is currently available on Blu-ray From Warner Archives. Ordering information can be found HERE
A crippled C-47 transport crash-lands on a remote Pacific island. For the Marines aboard, World War II becomes smaller, but no less deadly. The atoll is held by a Japanese platoon, also cut off from its command.
Debuting director Frank Sinatra stars in this suspenseful war saga, joined by Clint Walker, Tony Bill and Olympic champion Rafer Johnson. After initial bullet-laced confrontations, the Japanese leader (Tatsuya Mihashi) offers to swap water for the aid of Pharmacist Mate Maloney (Sinatra), whom he has mistaken for a doctor. When Maloney amputates the leg of a Japanese soldier and saves his life, peace results. But can it last? There are two sides to every war. None but the Brave skillfully shows the heroism of both.
Frank Sinatra added “director’ to his astonishing resume of wonder with this taut anti-war drama that looked back at World War II with a prescient message for a nation currently wading into the morass of Vietnam. A Japanese-American co-production (the first such venture) and adapted from a Japanese story, None But The Brave plays out a parallel tale of two sides enjoying a fragile truce told from the perspective of its narrator (Tatsuya Mihashi, High and Low), a reluctant soldier in command of a group of stranded Japanese soldiers. When a crippled C-47 carrying a complement of Marines crash lands on their island, the War in the Pacific plays out in miniature. Director Sinatra wisely lays back in his role as Pharmacist Mate turned medic Maloney, giving the heavy lifting to Mihashi and Clint Walker (The Dirty Dozen) as the commander of the American forces – eliciting powerful performances from both. This oft-overlooked war drama gets the sheen it long deserves with this sharp and striking presentation in 1080p HD. 16×9 Letterbox
ON THE TOWN screens at St. Louis’ fabulous Hi-Pointe Theater this weekend as part of their Classic Film Series. It’s Saturday, September 10th at 10:30am at the Hi-Pointe located at 1005 McCausland Ave., St. Louis, MO 63117. The film will be introduced by Harry Hamm, movie reviewer for KMOX. Admission is only $5
Three sailors on a day of shore leave in New York City look for fun and romance before their twenty-four hours are up. That summary to the beloved 1949 musical ON THE TOWN should be sung to the tune of “New York, New York,” the most famous song to come from this rollicking adaptation of the Broadway musical. There’s nary a dull moment as we watch Gene Kelly search desperately for Vera-Ellen, Frank Sinatra play a young and naive sailor (!) who tries to resist going up to Betty Garrett’s place but eventually gives in, and Jules Munshin add comedy to the proceedings while his young lovely, Ann Miller, adds her dancing skills. In fact, everyone sings and dances at one point or another (usually at several points), and all are excellent. Add the sly pop-culture references in the witty Betty Comden-Adolph Green script, the hilarious performance of Alice Pearce, recreating her Broadway role of the wacky roomate, and wonderful shots of New York itself, and you’ve got a fun-filled morning at The Hi-Pointe. Sure, the plot is nothing, and this can’t touch SINGIN’ IN THE RAIN, but who cares? It’s a fun film, and that’s more than enough for me.
You’ll have the opportunity to see ON THE TOWN on the big screen this Saturday at St. Louis’ fabulous Hi-Pointe Theater. Doors open at 10:00am, the film starts at 10:30 and admission is only $5
“Oh, Miss Higgins! You’re the prettiest manager in baseball!”
Celebrate two of America’s great pastimes, Baseball and the Hollywood Musical, this Saturday morning at St. Louis’ fabulous Hi-Pointe Theater this weekend as part of their Classic Film Series. It’s Saturday, April 13th at 10:30am at the Hi-Pointe located at 1005 McCausland Ave., St. Louis, MO 63117. Admission is only $5.
In TAKE ME OUT TO THE BALL GAME, set in the first decade of the 20th century, Frank Sinatra and Gene Kelly play Dennis Ryan and Eddie O’Brien, two best friends who play with the Brooklyn Wolves baseball club in the summer, then work the vaudeville circuit during the off-season (I guess ball players weren’t paid one hundred years ago what they are today). Their carefree lives are shaken up when go-getter Esther Williams inherits their franchise and takes over as an active, controversial, manager who annoys the heck out of man-about-town Eddie but charms the socks off girl-shy Denny.
The musical numbers in TAKE ME OUT TO THE BALL GAME were designed to showcase Kelly’s dancing and Sinatra’s vocals, with Sinatra only getting some light dancing to disguise his limitations. Sinatra and Garret team up for the tune ‘Baby, It’s Fate’. Gene Kelly’s best number is The Hat Me Father Wore on St. Patrick’s Day, a lively Irish jig that he performs with style. Sidekick Jules Munshin joins with Kelly and Sinatra for the physical ‘O-Brian to Ryan to Goldberg’ number, and Sinatra contributes his usual ballad, this time sung to Williams. The cast all get together for a barn-storming rendition of ‘Strictly USA’, which is repeated in the musical finale with some tongue-in-cheek lyrics (catch the references to Kelly and Sinatra’s frequent co-stars, Judy Garland and Kathryn Grayson). TAKE ME OUT TO THE BALL GAME was one of the last films directed by Busby Berkeley and is all prettily Technicolored in the way that only MGM could do when it came to musicals. It’s always fun to see Kelly and Sinatra kick up their heels in dance routines the way they did in ANCHORS AWEIGH and ON THE TOWN.
Don’t miss your chance to see TAKE ME OUT TO THE BALL GAME on the big screen.
Netflix has revolutionized the home movie experience for fans of film with its instant streaming technology. Netflix Nuggets is my way of spreading the word about independent, classic and foreign films being made available by Netflix for instant streaming. Important Note: There may be some films that do not become available on the specified dates. This is merely a report of the most accurate release dates I can find, but is not directly confirmed by Netflix themselves.Continue reading Netflix Nuggets: Breakfast Club, Rat Pack and Sexual Shenanigans
In what seems like a bit of a stretch, The Daily Mail online is reporting that Angelina Jolie and George Clooney will star as Marilyn Monroe and Ol’ Blue Eyes, Frank Sinatra, in a new film about the Hollywood bombshell.
The 35-year-old actress is set to play Monroe in an adaptation of Andrew O’Hagan’s The Life And Opinions Of Maf The Dog, And Of His Friend Marilyn Monroe, the author revealed at the Edinburgh Book Festival yesterday. And George Clooney has been lined up to play Monroe’s close friend Frank Sinatra, O’Hagan confirmed, adding that production on the film would begin soon. While Scarlett Johansson and Christina Hendricks had previously been in line for the role, it was eventually decided Jolie would be the best choice to play Monroe in the new film. The story will take place during the last two years of Monroe’s life.
Jolie bears more than a striking resemblance to Monroe in the film LIFE OR SOMETHING LIKE IT.
O’Hagan’s novel tells the story of Monroe’s final two years before her death in 1962 through the eyes of her pet Maltese terrier Maf – a gift from My Way singer Sinatra in 1960. As well as meeting Monroe’s friends including former U.S. President John F. Kennedy, Maf also accompanied the star to acting classes and restaurants.
Beloved pet: Monroe pictured with Maltese terrier Maf in 1961
When she received the dog from Sinatra, Monroe decided to call it Mafia – a joke reference to Sinatra, before shortening the name to Maf, or Maf Honey. In the book, written entirely from Maf’s perspective, the canine comments: ‘She was an artist to her fingertips… a strange and unhappy creature, but at the same she had more comedy to her than anybody I would ever know. More comedy and more art.’ When Monroe died in August 1962 aged 36, Maf was inherited by Sinatra’s secretary Gloria Lovell. It has not yet been revealed who will be voicing Maf in the movie.
For this biopic to be plausible, a director will need A-list actors like Jolie and Clooney to pull this off. I like the idea. What do you think?
