File #13 Ocean's Eleven/The Rat Pack

In Ocean's Eleven we finally get to see the Rat Pack together in film. A strong sense of masculinity is in place here but what makes it interesting is the somewhat various styles presented through each character. Frank Sinatra fits the playboy persona for all its worth while Dean Martin shows more of a feminine side while still being masculine, take the scene in which he calls himself mother for instance. Peter Lawford's holds a peculiar form of vulnerability and his economic place in the story sets him aside from the working class model for masculinity.  Sammy Davis Jr. plays more like a buddy-character to Danny Ocean which is strangely similar to his off-screen friendship with Frank Sinatra.
A great scene in which these masculinities are displayed is when they are all playing pool and talking about girls and money. Frank Sinatra appears the most progressive stating that he'd end miss universe and invite girls to exotic locations and talk to them (making them less like objects) while Peter Lawford takes the power approach wherein he describes that with power he would order women to go with him and use money to go into politics whether this could be viewed as a slant on conservatives or liberals depends on your camp while Dean Martin jokingly takes the politics approach a step further by suggesting taking women's rights to vote away and bring back slavery. All the while Sammy Davis brings nothing to the table except backing everyone up and making small jokes.
Overall Ocean's Eleven presents the Rat Pack in all it's glory, its more of a buddy film which just so happens to involve a casino heist in Las Vegas. The characters seem to more or less mirror the actors that portray them and the fact that the film takes place in Las Vegas makes it all the more easy to feel like we're watching the Rat Pack being the Rat Pack and not actors working together in a film.

FUN FACT: the guy who plays Duke Santos in this movie is none other than Cesar Romero: the first man to ever play the Joker on screen and famously refused to shave his mustache for the role.

File #12 Joker is Wild/Live @ Caesars Palace

Similar to his role in Guys and Dolls, in The Joker is Wild Frank Sinatra plays a man obsessed with gambling and avoiding commitments such as marriage. As with Sinatra’s role in The Man With the Golden Arm, Joe E. Lewis has had more than his fair of rough times especially with addictions. What’s more surprising is how this role seems to mirror Frank Sinatra himself. Like the character, Frank Sinatra seems utterly or subconsciously determined to remain single, entertain, and remain in Las Vegas nightclubs and casinos. What is perhaps more interesting is the connection with the home, in both Frank Sinatra’s personal life (ex. showing his home without knowing where anything is) and in the case of his character, Joe E. Lewis, Sinatra cannot find himself able to settle down.  

Another connection between his character and himself is shown in his live performance at Caesars Palace, wherein Frank performs the majority of his songs in a sort of self-mocking style with his own personal brand of humor. Yet one can’t help but notice how “at home” Frank Sinatra feels in Vegas. It is as if it was his natural habitat (the light musky fog of cigarette smoke, the faded lights and lively, party atmosphere), and as the proverbial saying goes, “What happens in Vegas, Stays in Vegas.

File #11 The Tender Trap/ Playboy Rising

In The Tender Trap Frank Sinatra plays a man of many women, a far cry from the characters he played in his earlier career such as Anchors Aweigh. Much like his recording persona, Frank Sinatra’s character here plays the role of a womanizing man unable to settle down and thus independently wealthy. This film seems to do a good job at embodying the playboy of the 1950s with the clash of his best friend (the married man) In an almost blunt fashion The Tender Trap can be seen as the taming of the playboy, showing that even such men as Sinatra’s character must eventually settle down and embody the married man persona. This can also be seen as city vs countryside wherein the city is viewed as the playboy’s playground and the countryside as the place in which men and women go to settle down. Unlike Frank Sinatra’s wartime characters his character in this film shares more of the sunny attitudes from his musical characters. He smokes rarely, he exhibits no agony of loss on the same level of his prior characters and in a way he is more or less smug. The Tender Trap, for us, is the beginning of the playboy years. 

and now your moment of zen, Frank Sinatra getting dissed by Orson Welles! 

Orson Welles roasts Frank

File #10 The Man with the Golden Arm

The Man with the Golden Arm shows a different side of Frank Sinatra similar to his role in From Here to Eternity, perhaps because he strongly wanted to play the part in both. In the film it is really hard to explain whether or not the character of Frankie Machine is a hero or antihero. I guess it really depends on what you view as a hero. If you think that hero is someone who is squeaky-clean, never breaks the rules, or always does the right ‘lawful’ thing than I would have to say Frankie Machine isn’t one of them. Likewise, if an antihero is something like The Punisher, fighting crime by killing criminals, or riding a black bike and taking names I do not think that quite fits Frankie either. At the end of the day though I would probably have to say he is a hero for the simple fact that he longs for redemption despite his surroundings, which are arguably what hinders him from doing so. At the end of the movie I’d argue that that redemption he seeks is finally achieved because he has kicked his addiction and cleared his name with the cops after the true killer (his wife) is exposed. 

Until next time!

File #9 Manchurian Candidate/The Donkey Agenda

The Manchurian Candidate is by all means a political thriller and depending on how you look at it you can interpret it different ways. On the one hand you can take Frank Sinatra’s character as a troubled conservative unhappy with the way things are run and possibly morphing into the opposition as the film goes on. There is no denying the obvious nod towards Republican senator Joseph McCarthy with Sen. John Yerkes Iselin and one could easily claim that the film conveys the typical liberal notion that the government and corporations traumatize innocent people into brainwashed killers. Another possible hint is the reaction Raymond Shaw has when meeting the Jordans, which he grows to like very much and who more likely than not are Democrats. The sheer appearance difference between the Jordans and the Iselins is also quite telling. Shaw’s mother dresses very conservatively, showing little skin while young Jocelyn thinks nothing of ripping off her shirt to wrap around Shaw’s leg before riding off on a bicycle. The same could be seen with Sen. Iselin and Sen. Jordan where one wears suits while the other first appears in relaxed wear. You could also presuppose that Mrs. Iselin serves as the human figure of conservatism wherein she finds it necessary to tell her son how he should do things.

Frank Sinatra’s dramatic war film characters seem to share a certain lack of naivety that their musical counterparts share. It is as if they are hardened versions of the musical characters sharing little more than the same face between them. Frank Sinatra acts more like a boy in his earlier films; one in which the world of women, pain, and loss remain a mystery. His older roles, on the contrary, share a sense of progression in that regard. These films so a maturity in the place of childhood, regret in the place of romantic longing and wisdom in the place of innocence, like a puppy thrown in a furnace reborn a junkyard dog. The glimmer of his former characters still twinkling in his eyes but noticeably stricken with the ravages of time.

File #8 None But the Brave/ He did it His Way

None but the Brave is Frank Sinatra’s only directorial work and as far as his approach goes, its more or less the same old Frank. Sinatra’s character has elements of Maggio from From Here to Eternity but a little more “Sinatra.” The story itself is surprisingly better than other actor/director attempts at this part of World War II (cough…cough…Clint Eastwood...cough, cough) 

The direction Frank Sinatra takes doesn’t fall far from the direction his other films took him and in a way it seemed almost ironic that he would do that to himself. However the film does serve to continue the star image he created after From Here to Eternity and Frank Sinatra seems almost in the backseat of his own film despite his amount of screen time. None but the Brave also seems to propel two important images for Sinatra 1) military roles = patriotism/working class hero/etc. sand 2) the way in which the story plays out seems very in line with Frank Sinatra’s personal views on race relations (despite his reference to, “those dirty Japs” in The House I Live In).  

Until next time! 

for your entertainment the story of Frank Sinatra via SNL, enjoy.

 Hulu - Saturday Night Live: The Story of Frank Sinatra

File #7 Kings Go Fourth/ War, Race, & Frank

Unlike in From Here to Eternity, Kings Go Forth sees Frank Sinatra as a more stable character however here too we find “trouble in paradise”. Sinatra is an Army officer who begins to fall in love with a French girl where he is stationed. However trouble begins when the girl declares that her biological father was black.

After reading Sinatra’s various remarks on race relations in America it seems almost ironic that his character at first has trouble dealing with this fact.

Compared to The House I Live In, Kings Go Forth differs not only by the obvious fact that the girl is half black and not religiously different but more importantly it touches upon the subject of cohabitation between blacks and whites. The House I Live In is more or less comparatively tame in its message. In fact all the kids involved where white, and instead of focusing on the subject of racial differences it instead talks about religious differences and patriotism and standing together against those no good dirty Japs, which after the fact seems a bit racist in it of itself. Kings Go Forth is in a way also tame because the girl, Monique, is only half black thus making it only half a problem for Sinatra’s character.  

I wonder how the reception by the audience and the character’s resolutions would change if Monique were fully black or if instead of Frank Sinatra it were a black man and the girl was white? 

Ever wonder what a duet with Sinatra and Stevie Wonder would be like? SNL did and its hilarious!

Stevie wonder and Frank S. on Yahoo! Video

Until next time, over and out!