Frank Sinatra – The Early Years + The Golden Years (Warner Bros. DVD Box Sets)
Early set Picture: C+ Sound: C Extras: D Films: C+
Golden set Picture: C+ Sound/Extras/Film:
Man With The Golden Arm (1955) C/C+/B
Otto Preminger’s groundbreaking film was also a surprise hit with
Sinatra as a drug addict at a time when that was severely underground, holds up
well and after so many bad video copies, it is nice to see it looking so
good. Darren McGavin is his dealer, Kim
Novak and Eleanor Parker as the women in his life. Both the Saul Bass opening and Elmer
Bernstein score are classics. Originally
released by United Artists, the Preminger Estate owns it and that is how Warner
has it here.
The Tender Trap (1955) C+/C/B-
A comedy with a serious undertones with Debbie Reynolds as his love
interest in this surprisingly mature work with Celeste Holm, Carolyn Jones and
David Wayne leading the cast in song, jokes and drama.
Some Came Running (1958) C/C+/B
Vincente Minnelli’s complex, risk-taking drama has Sinatra as a soldier
returning home to his small town celebrating their centenary, but all is not
well and will get worse as a traveler (Shirley MacLaine) starts falling for him
and a hustler (Dean Martin) starts interfering with both of them. One of Scorsese’s ten best widescreen films,
it remains a masterwork and even this critic may be underrating it. Martha Hyer and Arthur Kennedy also star.
None But The Brave (1965) C+/C-/B-
A war film with Sinatra directing as the film examines both sides
between the U.S. and Japan in this smart, thoughtful film that works more often
than not. Compares well with the current
cycle of War genre work.
Marriage On The Rocks (1965) C/C-/B-
The surprise gem in this set, Sinatra stars opposite Deborah Kerr in
this comedy about the two as a married couple driving each other nuts, with her
so bored that she becomes interested in his friend, played by Dean Martin. Cy Howard’s screenplay is witty, palpable and
Jack Donahue’s directing is at its best.
Cesar Romero, Hermione Baddeley, John McGiver, Nancy Sinatra and even
Trini Lopez show up in this classy romp that holds up remarkably well.
Arm is anamorphically enhanced black
and white 1.85 X 1 m while the others are anamorphically enhanced 2.35 X 1 film
with the older two CinemaScope and the later two Panavision and three-strip
Technicolor. Trap is EastmanColor, while Some
is MetroColor. All are a bit soft, while
the Metro and Technicolor could look a bit better, but we’ll see how the
Blu-rays compare whenever they arrive.
All are limited Dolby Digital 1.0 Mono, while Trap is Dolby Digital 5.1 and Some
2.0 Stereo. Playback is best on the
latter two. This is the best any of them
have looked in a while just the same.
On the Early set, the 1.33 x 1 black and white
image on four films and Technicolor image on Kissing are pretty good, if still a tads softer than they should be
and all are Dolby Digital 1.0 Mono, all sounding more limited than they
should. None of them have extras, while
trailers are on all the Golden DVDs,
with making of featurettes added to Arm
and Some, while Frank In The Fifties
appears on Trap. All are must-sees with great interviews. The films in the Early set include:
Higher & Higher (1943) is a comedy Sinatra did
for RKO with music and a riches-to-rags story with Michele Morgan, Jack Haley,
Leon Errol, Barbara Hale, Victor Borge, Mary Wickes and Dooley Wilson in this
decent romp.
Step Lively (1944) has Sinatra, Adolphe
Menjou, Gloria De Haven, Walter Slezak, Eugene Pallette, George Murphy as a
hitmaker in this popular Backstage Musical with RKO going all out again.
It Happened In Brooklyn (1947) has Sinatra, Kathryn
Grayson, Peter Lawford, Gloria Grahame and Jimmy Durante in this MGM romantic
comedy production about G.I.s returning from WWII duty. You get more chemistry here than you might
think.
The Kissing Bandit (1948) is a somewhat dated
Western comedy with Sinatra sending up singing cowboys and Grayson returning as
his co-star in yet another MGM comedy, this one with more money and color. J. Carrol Naish is among the supporting cast,
but it is the dance sequence with Ricardo Montalban, Ann Miller and Cyd
Charisse that is the show-stopper.
Double Dynamite (1951) has Sinatra back as a bank
clerk who can sing (at RKO this time) romancing Jane Russell, with Groucho Marx
getting in the way in this comedy that was made before the studio started to go
into permanent decline. The RKOs are
among the gems here and the biggest reason this set works.
For more
Sinatra on film, try this link:
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/5824/Frank+Sinatra+MGM+Movie+Legends
- Nicholas Sheffo
