Some Came Running [VHS]

Some Came Running [VHS]
by Vincente Minnelli

Some Came Running [VHS]

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Product details

Actor: Arthur Kennedy, Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra, Martha Hyer, Shirley MacLaine
Director: Vincente Minnelli
Cinematographer: William H. Daniels
Editor: Adrienne Fazan
Producer: Sol C. Siegel
Writer: Arthur Sheekman
Writer: James Jones
Writer: John Patrick
Edition: VHS Tape
Audio: English (Original Language), Analog
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, HiFi Sound, NTSC
Running Time: 137 minutes
Release Date: 1998-09-01
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Publisher: MGM (Warner)
Studio: MGM (Warner)

VHS Movie Reviews of Some Came Running [VHS]

Movie Review: Excellent but a tear jerker
Summary: 5 Stars

This is an excellent movie involving three of the best actors. I don't remember if it received any academy award nominations, but it should have. A good story and superb acting especially by Ms. Maclaine.

Movie Review: What may possibly be MacLaine's greatest performance...
Summary: 3 Stars

I am a huge fan of Shirley MacLaine. I consider her one of our finest actresses of all time and simply adore everything she touches (almost). After seeing `The Manchurian Candidate' I wasn't too keen on watching another Frank Sinatra movie, but my friends were telling me just how wonderful MacLaine is here, and so I just needed to see this. I did, and while I can't say that the movie itself is one I'd rush out to watch again, I must admit that MacLaine's performance ranks at the top of my list as one of the greatest supporting performances of all time (in fact, recently some friends and I ranked our top 5 in each of Oscar's categories and MacLaine made it on all our ballots for this performance, ranking in at number 3 for me personally).

The film follows G.I. Dave Hirsh as he comes home after a long absence and a string of unsuccessful novels. Hoping to start over and write something great, Hirsh winds up involved with a professional gambler, a floozy, a mannered schoolteacher and his brother, Frank, who is far from perfect himself (although a lot self-righteous).

I know that a lot of people just ate this movie up, but personally I couldn't really fall in love with it. I felt that the storyline was intriguing enough (failed writer searching for himself amidst people he rarely connects to) and I felt that as a whole the acting was rather good (MacLaine was impeccable, Martin was remarkable, Kennedy and Hyer were respectable and Sinatra was, well, decent) but there is just something missing here that made it hard for me to truly connect with. I found myself simply satisfied, nothing more, nothing less.

It's not a bad film; it's just not a great one. It's rather `middle of the road'.

As Hirsh, Sinatra is serviceable, but to be honest I find him rather bland at times. He wasn't a very accomplished actor despite his accolades and large following. I appreciate the talent he has (as a singer) but in the end his acting career leaves some to be desired. This is probably the better of the performances I've seen, but it's not a knock out. I think that he may be the biggest reason I couldn't `connect' with the film. I found him to be off putting at times, and not in the `this is my character so admire my dedication to my role' kind of way; he was just `off putting'. In order to really invest yourself in this film you have to be able to get inside Hirsh's head and relate to him, but Sinatra made that hard for me. I felt a much deeper draw to the cast of character's that walked in and out of his life.

Martin fares better here, MUCH better. He has the suave coolness about him that resonates very well with his character. I would have much rather seen him collect a Supporting Actor nomination over Kennedy. Kennedy has the right amount of nervous jitters to make his character likable despite his hypocrisy, and Hyer is enticing in her reserved affections. The supporting cast is all really good, from Leora Dana's bossy demeanor to Nancy Gates' seductive presence and Betty Lou Keirn's adoring curiosity.

But no one, and I mean NO ONE, comes close to Shirley MacLaine. Let me just say this; what MacLaine does here is beyond brilliant. She is equal parts lovely and shrill, intriguing and repelling, adoring and annoying. She manages to be the `complete person', giving us reason upon reason to keep watching the film with hopes of seeing more and more of her. Her emotional connection to Sinatra's character (or shall I say her `need' to feel connected to something) is felt with every breath she takes, and the climax is so deeply moving (heartbreaking) that one cannot deny the connection they have made with this simple minded yet big hearted woman.

This is a performance for the ages and should have netted her the Oscar (albeit, she was nominated in the WRONG category).

In the end, I recommend this film for the performances, which for the most part are enough to carry the entire film. It is lacking as a whole for me, but in the end it is far from bad and a film that will satisfy to say the least. See it for MacLaine, seriously, because there are few performances this rich and this close to perfection.

Movie Review: Minnelli's excellent melodrama
Summary: 4 Stars

Director Vincente Minnelli is best rememberd as the great master of Hollywood-musicals, but he was also excellent director of comedies and melodramas. Some Came Running is probably the best of his late melodramas. It paints a rather pessimistic and very critical view of repressive sexual morals in a small town America. Either you live in a sexless marriage as an "honorable" citizen, or then you'll be shut outside society as a prostitute, a gambler and/or an alcoholic. Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin are very good in this glowing Technicolor-melodrama, but Shirley MacLaine outshines them both!

Movie Review: Some Came Running
Summary: 1 Stars

Never received item from seller. Had to submit for a refund. "DO NOT BUY FROM THIS SELLER!!!"

Movie Review: Not a Complete Work of Art
Summary: 4 Stars

Wide Screen Color Bonanaza, Vincente Minnelli, Judy's hubby, known for lavish Hollywood Musicals, does a very theatrical late 1950's melodrama, almost Douglas Sirk like. Oh, the repressed sexuality and hypocracy. It's not a 50's Hitchcock masterpiece like Vertigo or To Catch a Thief, but the film's from a pot-boiler James Jones novel, takes itself pretty seriously, slicing away that exotic Indiana underbelly with Shirley MacLaine doin the cupie doll stereotype. Arthur Kennedy does not look like Frank Sinatra's brother, but he is slimey. Frank and Dean play, ah, Frank and Dean. Look, there's good scenes, despite some hokey steamy stuff.

The real meat of this film, the Sinatra-MacLaine insult and love me scenes, nice work and Dean comes in for a mean-turn that's kind of believable. But the best, the Director's carnival-at-night killer shots with the pulsating brass score, that's film making. Still, all parts together, it's not complete as a work of art.

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Summary of Some Came Running [VHS]

The first time Frank Sinatra acted in an adaptation of a James Jones novel, he won an Oscar--it was in From Here to Eternity. The resurgent Sinatra found one of his best subsequent roles as a bitter, boozy failed writer, the hero of Jones's Some Came Running. Returning to his hometown in the Midwest, he runs into the rampant hypocrisy of the "good" life, as embodied by his insincere brother (Arthur Kennedy). Sinatra the cynic plumps for the company of a floozy (Shirley MacLaine) and a misogynist gambler (Dean Martin), while making a desperate bid for the affection of a strait-laced teacher (Martha Hyer). Director Vincente Minnelli (Meet Me in St. Louis) infuses the material with a slow-burning tension, and the climax at a carnival is an eye-filling piece of orchestrated chaos. Elmer Bernstein's moody score is another plus. Footnote to film history: the hero of Jean-Luc Godard's Contempt says he wears his hat in the bathtub as an hommage to Dean Martin in Some Came Running. --Robert Horton

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