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SOME CAME RUNNING
Based on Robinson, Illiinois' favorite son, James Jones, stars Frank Sinatra (who also starred in Jones' story FROM HERE TO ETERNITY), as well as Sinatra's pal Dean Martin and rat pack mascot young Shirley McLaine.
The big influence on the look of the film is Director Vincente Minelli. He brings his usual veneer of glamour and his usual indifference to actors, two of whom (Martin and McLaine) turn in surprisingly broad and unsatisfactory performances. Martin, however, was able to recycle his character's loose hickishness into his repertoire of "drunky talk" for his variety show of the '70's - listen carefully and you'll hear a definite strain of that in his character "Bama."
The action takes place in the fictional town of Parkman, Indiana, as well as other Hoosier locations that include Terre Haute and Indianapolis. If there was ever a nightclub remotely like the one depicted here - in sleepy little Terre Haute - I sure hope someone will chime in and document it before it fades from human history. I sincerely doubt such a place ever existed, except perhaps in the mind of Minelli and in this movie.
You do get to see some close-ups of small-town America as it existed before Wal-Mart and endless fast-food franchises and chain stores. That's a plus. However, I found that there also were major irritants within a slow-paced movie about the psychology of coming back from war that manages to reveal very little about that experience. Sinatra comes out with his dignity - and the movie comes out with 2 1/2 stars.
Based on Robinson, Illiinois' favorite son, James Jones, stars Frank Sinatra (who also starred in Jones' story FROM HERE TO ETERNITY), as well as Sinatra's pal Dean Martin and rat pack mascot young Shirley McLaine.
The big influence on the look of the film is Director Vincente Minelli. He brings his usual veneer of glamour and his usual indifference to actors, two of whom (Martin and McLaine) turn in surprisingly broad and unsatisfactory performances. Martin, however, was able to recycle his character's loose hickishness into his repertoire of "drunky talk" for his variety show of the '70's - listen carefully and you'll hear a definite strain of that in his character "Bama."
The action takes place in the fictional town of Parkman, Indiana, as well as other Hoosier locations that include Terre Haute and Indianapolis. If there was ever a nightclub remotely like the one depicted here - in sleepy little Terre Haute - I sure hope someone will chime in and document it before it fades from human history. I sincerely doubt such a place ever existed, except perhaps in the mind of Minelli and in this movie.
You do get to see some close-ups of small-town America as it existed before Wal-Mart and endless fast-food franchises and chain stores. That's a plus. However, I found that there also were major irritants within a slow-paced movie about the psychology of coming back from war that manages to reveal very little about that experience. Sinatra comes out with his dignity - and the movie comes out with 2 1/2 stars.