Some Came Running (1958) User Reviews

Shirley steals the show

[bkoganbing · 7/10 · 9 April 2004]

In any other year Shirley MacLaine would have walked off with the Best Actress Oscar, but NO ONE was going to take it from Susan Hayward in 1958.

In fact the film is filled with nominations, Arthur Kennedy for Best Supporting Actor, Martha Hyer for Best Supporting Actress and these were great performances. Dean Martin does a great follow-up to The Young Lions in playing Bama Dillert here. This was no stretch for Dino however. This is exactly the kind of background he came from, so the part fit him like a comfortable old shoe.

The flaw is Sinatra. To his credit, he really tries hard and succeeds in spots. But he's miscast in a part that either Paul Newman or Montgomery Clift might have taken an Oscar home for.

But the acting honors go to MacLaine. The high point of the movie is her scene with Martha Hyer in Martha's classroom at the college. This poor pathetic Ginny Moorehead trying to assess her situation vis a vis Dave Hirsch pulls all the stops out. You have to be made of stone not to be moved by her pleas to Martha Hyer and Hyer's reactions in this scene probably got her, her nomination.

If you can get past a miscast Frank Sinatra, then this film is a gem.

Shirley MacLaine steals the show.

[dbdumonteil · 8/10 · 12 August 2001]

The fifties were melodrama heyday:Douglas Sirk and Vincente Minelli were masters of the genre at the time.Frank Sinatra plays the main character,but,little by little,it's Shirley Mac Laine who steals the show.She's the hackneyed big-hearted whore -a character she was to play again,on a more comic mode,in "Irma la douce"-,and what's extraordinary is that such a clichéd woman can touch us so closely.Her scene with Martha Hyer who plays a chic lit university professor is absolutely mind-boggling when she humbles before her.Her love for Dave is not shared,because,although the former writer stands aloof from his brother's respectable family,Gwen (Hyer) represents something he can't renounce.He does not marry Ginny (MCLaine) out of love but in a fit of pique.Ginny knows she's been cheated,but her love is so strong that she accepts everything.When Dave understands,it will be too late.The final scene is not far from that of "Imitation of life" and Ginny and the black servant Annie in Sirk's movie are some kind of cousins.

Godard always had the best taste.

[alice liddell · 8/10 · 27 October 1999]

Typical Minnelli masterpiece, as melodramatic, emotional and stylised as his more famous musicals. Lumpen James Jones novel stripped to the bone, its macho posturings shifted to anatomy of a society. Slow, repetitive narrative mirrors stagnation of such a society. Impotence, disease and writer's block all part of a wider malaise. The psychological visuals are unsurpassed, gaudy, intense floods of light, colour and composition disrupt superficial politeness. Climax one of the greatest in American cinema; the three male leads do the most difficult work of their careers. Shirley MacLaine gets hard deal, though.

Powerful, stylish Minnelli gem!

[david-greene5 · 10 August 2004]

Vincente Minelli was a master at creating powerful cinematic imagery that made unforgettable many a film which, in other hands, might have been quite ordinary. So many aspects of the story he deals with in "Some Came Running" had to be compromised because of the censorship issues that governed movies of that era. This led to some very awkward scripting, suggesting but never explicitly spelling out much that was central to the story. As a result, the drama veers into a rather dated soap-opera feel from time to time.

The wonder of this picture lies in how the director draws consistently strong performances from his cast and then, using striking visual compositions, magical lighting, stunning use of color, delivers a startlingly powerful result. Like so many of his films, this is the sort of richly satisfying visual experience that you want to re-visit again and again.

Serious home theater buffs should loudly protest that such Minnelli masterpieces as "Some Came Running", Home from the Hill" and "Lust for Life" are still unreleased as widescreen DVD's. This seems so shamefully, incomprehensibly neglectful!

Entertaining But Ill Conceived

[aimless-46 · 6/10 · 25 April 2006]

At 1200+ pages the James Jones novel "Some Came Running" deals with family divisions, drinking, gambling, sexual repression, adultery and other small town USA vices. All this is embedded in a general theme about the hypocrisy so pervasive in 1948 Middle America.

Jones was most famous for his explorations of WWII and its aftermath. "Some Came Running" is somewhat autobiographical as Jones was one of those returning soldiers from WWII whose long absence gave them a new perspective on details in the social fabric that they had not really noticed before. He was from a small town in Illinois and served in the 25th Infantry Division. He was present during the attack on Pearl Harbor and the battle of Guadalcanal. Basing "From Here to Eternity" and "The Thin Red Line on his experiences.

The film adaptation of "Some Came Running" is long but entertaining, especially if you like seeing a lot of big-name stars. Despite its setting in a small town (it was filmed in Madison, Indiana) this was a big budget epic picture.

The Jones character is named Dave Hirsch and played by Frank Sinatra. He is a successful writer but has not written anything for several years. The film begins inside a bus on its way to Dave's hometown of Parkman, Indiana. He has just been discharged from the army and is wearing his uniform (no rank insignia is visible).

His brother Frank (Arthur Kennedy) has become a big shot in the town and introduces him to Gwen French (Martha Hyer), a college literature teacher who is impressed with his writing but put off by his wild life style. Dave has been followed to Parkton by Ginny (Shirley MacLaine), an airhead he met in a Chicago bar. This sets up the film's love triangle.

Dave becomes friends with a local gambler named Bama Dillert (Dean Martin), moves into his house, and pairs up with him on the regional poker circuit where they are very successful.

While Dave tries to come to terms with his roots and with his future, his brother Frank begins an affair with his secretary.

Generally speaking, adopting a 1200 page book to the screen is ill advised and "Some Came Running" is no exception, if only because the screenwriter incorporated too much of the story for a feature length film to handle effectively.

But the producers compounded this problem with the hiring Vincente Minnelli as director and by casting for box office draw instead of acting talent. This resulted in a film with slick production values, an extremely thin plot, lots of characters (but none with any depth), and a too long running time. Can you say flat, lifeless, prosaic, and unconvincing?

Minnelli was a freak about visual details. He was more interested in whether an actress' dress coordinated well with the wallpaper in the set than how the actress handled her character. The inexperienced MacLaine has commented on how the only guidance she received during filming was from her male co-stars. In fact it was Sinatra who insisted the film end differently than the book as a way to make MacLaine's character more memorable. Minnelli's lack of interest in acting for the camera made him an especially poor choice for an overloaded film that needed subtle and nuanced elements in each scene to flesh out the characterization.

For the same reason, a non-actor like "one-take" Sinatra was completely over-matched by the demands of playing his character. Sinatra was comfortable playing himself in front of the camera and in most of his roles this was more than satisfactory, as it is during the early stages of "Some Came Running". But things start to crash and burn with the start of his scenes with Hyer, and the film essentially collapses the first time he reveals that he loves her.

Because of time constraints this romance had to be compressed, requiring a really skilled performance to set up things for the declaration of love, if it is to be at all convincing. Even if Sinatra took direction well (he didn't) and even if Minnelli was a master of acting for the camera (few were worse), the sudden transformation from Sinatra to lovesick puppy would have been a difficult sell.

A very interesting element of this film is Minnelli's obsession with the sets and the moving camera. There are no close-ups and relatively few medium shots. Almost everything is a wide shot or the master shot itself. This could reflect Minnelli's overriding interest in showcasing his sets, or indicate that Sinatra's work habits made changing camera setups difficult, or that the editor found that many of the performances could not withstand close scrutiny. Whatever the cause, it makes it much more difficult to identify and connect with characters who are always so distant from the camera. This is a detail you may want to watch for the next time you see the film.

This was Dean Martin's signature performance and he is truly excellent. Arthur Kennedy won an Oscar for his portrayal of Frank Hirsh but I think the best performance of all was by Leora Dane as his wife Agnes. Their scenes together have real energy, and almost creepy believability.

Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.

Florid Dreams

[telegonus · 9/10 · 22 August 2002]

A product of the Eisenhower fifties, Some Came Running, adapted from a James Jones novel, stars Frank Sinatra as a footloose writer returning to his Midwestern home town right after World War II. Directed by Vincente Minnelli, in a grand, florid manner, it is essentially a smart soap opera, with some very deep emotions, shot in garish color, that can at its best bear comparison with the films of Douglas Sirk, and is in some ways better, more imaginative. The story matters less than the characters, which aside from Sinatra's artist-in-uniform, include an alcoholic Southern gambler, played by Dean Martin, who's also his best friend; a pathetic floozie from Chicago who followed Sinatra home (Shirley MacLaine); Sinatra's brother, a frustrated if successful businessman (Arthur Kennedy); and a prim, somewhat stuffy school-teacher (Martha Hyer), who admires Sinatra as a writer but cares little for him as a man. Sinatra is torn between bad girl MacLaine and good girl Hyer; and though the former is easy to be with, if not much of a conversationalist, the latter is an ice princess, and proud of it. Understandably, Sinatra reverts to gambling, drinking and carousing with friend Dean Martin, but is clearly not happy with it. He would like to find a place in society, but how? Where?

This one could have been a classic, and the cast is for the most part excellent. MacLaine's Method-ish performance is the only jarring note, but it's a loud one. A number of things keep the film "down", or at any rate in second gear. First of all Minnelli was as man and director such an aesthete that he spends much of his time painting with his camera. Aided in no small measure by the excellent photography of William Daniels, his compositions and color create an often surreal effect, almost hallucinogenic, ultimately anti-realistic, though fascinating to watch, and this in the end detracts from the story. On the other hand Minnelli was good with people, and his more intimate scenes between people who really know each other,--Sinatra and Martin, Sinatra and MacLaine--show a genuine understanding of human behavior. Back and forth the movie goes. That its setting is Indiana make both the movie and the characters seem out of place in this most conservative of midwestern states. There is none of the wholeness here that one gets from, for instance, Kazan's On the Waterfront, where everything comes together beautifully and nothing is out of place. Here everyone seems to belong either elsewhere or nowhere, to be thinking or dreaming of other things, to not really care much for their surroundings. There is also a strong undercurrent of Tennessee Williams and William Inge-inspired textbook Freud, with the characters either sexually obsessed, sexually frustrated or sexually avoidant. I doubt the word sex is ever actually used in the movie, but it's everywhere. The Elmer Bernstein score, jazzy and doubtless influenced by Alex North's music for Streetcar Named Desire, tends to telegraph, often hilariously, how one ought to feel about what's going on, especially the raunchy, down-dirty greasy horns he deploys whenever the story moves to the wrong side of the tracks or to a card game, as if to say, "Okay Middle America, this is NOT the way to be".

For all its flaws, the movie has many grace notes, some of them even musical, as Bernstein occasionally redeems himself, especially in his lovely main theme. The compartmentalized, evasive lives most of the characters in the film live are, shorn of the melodrama, not unlike real life. Even when the plot becomes predictable the underlying emotions of the main characters remain authentic, and the result is in many ways a compartmentalized movie that at times seems to take its style from the dreams and fantasies of its various characters, becoming in effect their view of life rather than their actual lives. This feeling of fantasy versus reality becomes the movie's major issue when an old boyfriend of MacLaine's shows up, starts drinking, and begins to stalk her. The danger in the air is palpable, and as many of these later scenes take place literally in a carnival atmosphere, the film becomes simultaneously urgent and otherworldly, like someone coming off a mescaline trip who suddenly realizes that he's standing on the ledge of a twenty storey building. This was very daring of Minnelli, and I'm sure intentional, and the ending is truly heartbreaking, and yet aesthetic also, with the director refusing to give up his florid manner even in the last scene. I sense that the tragedy in the film had a very private meaning for Minnelli, and that he intended for it to have the same effect on the audience; to trigger personal issues in each viewer that he could take away from the movie which were independent of the movie. In this he succeeded magnificently.

Melodramatic Soap Opera about Hypocrisy and Love

[claudio_carvalho · 7/10 · 22 May 2010]

In the post-war, the alcoholic and bitter veteran military and former writer Dave Hirsch (Frank Sinatra) returns from Chicago to his hometown Parkman, Indiana. He is followed by Ginnie Moorehead (Shirley MacLaine), a vulgar and easy woman with whom he spent his last night in Chicago that has fallen in love with him. The resentful Dave meets his older brother Frank Hirsh (Arthur Kennedy), who owns a jewelry store and is a prominent citizen of Parkman that invites him to have dinner with his family. Dave meets his sister-in-law Agnes (Leora Dana) that hates him since one character of his novel had been visibly inspired on her, and his teenage niece Dawn (Betty Lou Keim). Frank introduces the school teacher Gwen French (Martha Hyer) to him and Dave feels attracted by the beautiful woman that is daughter of his former Professor Robert Haven French (Larry Gates) and idolizes his work as writer. However, his unrequited love with Gwen drives Dave back to the local bar where he befriends the professional gambler Bama Dillert (Dean Martin) and meets Ginnie again with the Chicago's mobster Raymond Lanchak (Steven Peck) that was her former lover and has followed her from Chicago. The unconditional love of Ginnie for Dave leads to a tragedy in the calm Parkman.

"Some Came Running" is a melodramatic soap opera about hypocrisy and love in a small American town by Vincente Minnelli. Every character in the story is flawed, bitter, hypocrite, insecure, gossiper, false and the unconditional love of Ginnie with Dave is probably the most beautiful and pure feeling in this romance despite the reputation of Ginnie. This character is magnificently performed by the lovely and sweet Shirley MacLaine and the dialogs are witty and harsh. This story recalls "Peyton Place" that also shows the stereotypical lifestyle of a small town in America in the late 40's. The false morality and intolerance rules the relationships among the dwellers, with gossips, sexual repression and snobbery are very similar. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Deus Sabe o Quanto Amei!" ("God Knows How Much I Have Loved")

A Great American Tragedy

[jacksflicks · 9/10 · 23 June 2001]

This is one of the most heartbreaking, heart-rending films I have ever seen. There are many levels in this story of the returning soldier: his conflict with his brother, with his community, with his beloved and with himself. But for me, the most poignant is the story of Dave Hirsh and Ginny Moorhead. Dave is searching for redemption; he is emotionally needy and spiritually enervated. He thinks he can find love in someone who can fill his creative needs and the void in his heart created by the war.

Here is the tragedy: Dave does not realize that real love can only come from a sense of self worth, from finding someone whom he not only needs but, just as important, who needs him. Ginny is an angel, an angel in the form of a wrong-side-of-the-tracks bimbo; but of all those in Dave's world, Ginny is the purest of heart and the purest in love, and her love is for Dave. When Dave finally realizes that his bliss lies with Ginny, it is too late, for both him and Ginny. And this ending comes in a moment that left me shattered, my mouth agape.

While the ending was not expected, neither was it contrived, and with hindsight, one could see its coming.

"Some Came Running" captures a time and culture only now beginning to fade from the collective memory, as its cohort ages and dies off, America immediately following World War II. And as a period piece, "Some Came Running" is quite successful. But I believe the story depicted here is a universal one, and I think the characters of Dave and Ginny and their sidekick Bama, played wonderfully by Dean Martin, are to be found anywhere. In fact, "Some Came Running," along with "From Here to Eternity," is the closest American cinema has come to being Shakespearian, without consciously trying to be.

You Can't Go Home Again.

[rmax304823 · 6/10 · 25 January 2013]

Accompanied by Shirley MacLaine, a hooker he picked up in Chicago, Sinatra, a self-described failed writer, is discharged from the US Army and wakes up, hung over, in his home town of Parkman, Indiana. It's the first time he's been home in eighteen years. It's supposed to be 1948, although you'd never know it. Thereafter, intrigues and jealousies and conflicts come and go, evoking memories of soap operas, only told from the man's point of view instead of Craig's other wife's.

There are no bands to welcome Sinatra. His older brother, Arthur Kennedy, is a pompous loudmouth who owns a jewelry shop. The script renders Kennedy as a hypocrite but doesn't deprive him of some human qualities. He loves his teen-aged daughter, is treated indifferently by his wealthy wife, and suffers a lapse in his morality when, stricken by an understandable loneliness, he makes it with his attractive secretary, Nancy Gates.

Sinatra has given up writing, almost, but take up with the town's intellectuals, including Martha Hyer as a professor of creative writing, who finds his work admirable and sells one of his stories to The Atlantic magazine. (Short story writing; an art now as dead as Medieval glass blowing.) Hyer is an actress whose appeal has always eluded me. She's attractive enough but her performances always sound as if she's demonstrating her skill in a beauty contest. Her character here is cultured and unnatural. She's physically attracted to Sinatra. Of course. He's Chairman of the Board. But the ex-soldier's emotions are to powerful for her and she rejects him and his lower-class friends.

Sinatra's friends include the gambler, Dean Martin, who is able to drink three times as much as Old Blue Eyes and the next morning, when Sinatra looks a thorough wreck, manages to be spic and span and on top of his game -- at least until he discovers he has Type 2 diabetes, which he shrugs off.

Shirley MacLaine is an agreeable actress. She's pretty, despite the make-up overload and wretched wardrobe, and forthright in her artless candor. She'd do anything for Frank because she loves him beyond imagining. In the end, that's what's required of her.

I know it was directed by Vincent Minelli but it's hard to tell. Everything about the movie is more or less routine. It's not one of Elmer Bernstein's better scores -- superabundant and lurid. Colorful characters in everyday settings doing things that aren't especially interesting.

Excllent Drama With Memorable Characters

[perfectbond · 9/10 · 1 December 2002]

I haven't read the James Jones novel on which this film is based so I can't comment on the movie as an adaption. But as a film standing alone Some Came Running was a very enjoyable experience. All the players are very convincing in their roles. Sinatra as usual mixes world weariness and hope better than just about anyone. His wonderful voice here is as good as its reputation. Shirley MacClaine who was Oscar nominated for this role is also memorable as the simple party girl with an unrequited love for Dave Hirsh. Mention must also be made of the actress who played the school teacher. She perfectly nailed some very difficult scenes that required her to subtly change beats. Dean Martin's sidekick character was also very entertaining. Highly recommended! 9/10.

Overlong and sprawling drama with passion and romance , being set in smalltown America

[ma-cortes · 7/10 · 5 March 2021]

A garish , extreme drama about thunderous relationships , complex love stories and tragic events . Madison, Indiana , 73 miles from Cincinnati , suddenly found itself elevated to more than just an insignificant spot on the American map due to this film . Dealing with a burn-out writer called David Hirsh : Frank Sinatra returning from the war to the small town he grew up, and along the way , he is chased by a vulgar , neurotic woman : Shirley McLaine who fell in love for him . Concerning the dramatic curve of Sinatra's agonising voyage of self-discovery and as a result ends in his self-acceptance . Other central characters are Arthur Kennedy as his brother , Dean Martin as a compulsive card player , the wealthy teacher Martha Hyer , among others

An intense, spectacular drama about snobbishness with thrills , brawls , emotion , tragic romances and anything else . It provides a contrived plot with superbly orchestred intensity of the feelings the main roles generate in their numerous clashes . Producers financed a big budget and star-studded cast to carry out this great production in which 80 actors and location workers moved in overnight to make the movie of James Jones' massive novel. Madison bore a remarkable resemblance to Jones' description of the fictional town of Parkman. Main and support cast are pretty good . Frank Sinatra is frankly well as Dave Hirsh returning serviceman meets all shorts of prejudices and problems, and Shirley MacLaine provides overacting as a silly street girl , while Dean Martin gives surprisingly one of his best interpretations as a stubborn gambler . And support cast is frankly magnificent , such as : Arthur Kennedy , Nancy Gates , Leora Dana , but was durable blonde Martha Hyer who grabbed the movie's nomination .

Colorful cinematography in Technicolor by William H Daniels , showing splendidly cheap-neon lit bars and cold houses . Moving and stirring musical score by Elmer Bernstein in his usual style. This brawling and attractive motion picture was competently directed by Vincente Minnelli . Vincente was one of the best Hollywod professionals , shooting a lot of films with penchant for Musical , Drama and Comedy , such as : Cabin in the Sky, Meet me in St Louis , Yolanda and the Thief, The Clock , Ziegfeld Follies , The Pirate , Undercurrent , Madame Bovary , Father of the Bride, An American in París, The Bad and the Beautiful, The Band Wagon, The long long trailer , Brigadoon , Kismet, The Cobweb , Tea and sympathy , Gigi , Bells are ringing , Two weeks in another town, The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse , Goodbye Charlie , The Sandpiper , A matter of Time , among others. Rating 7/10 . Better that average . Worthwhile watching .

"Rat-Pack" Classic with MacLaine in Stand-Out Performance!

[mdm-11 · 8/10 · 30 September 2004]

Frank Sinatra and Shirley MacLaine are perfectly cast as the embittered, street-wise/intellectual "black sheep" and the floozie with a heart of gold. As the 2 1/2 hour drama unfolds, the viewer learns that the "respectable people" are often hypocrites, shielding their shame behind money and power. More concerned about "what the papers will print" than about how human beings are affected by misfortunes and embarrassing incidents.

The tragic ending hints at a re-birth of human compassion in a Payton Place-like town where the haves and the have-nots are in contrast of each other. The Frank Sinatra character evolves from embittered teenager who is shipped off to boarding school by a newlywed adult brother, to respected author (exposing the hypocrisies of his hometown with his thinly disguised autobiographical novels), to revenge seeking released military man/gambler. The street girl who falls in unanswered love with him, sticks by him to the end. Unanswered questions are left to the viewer's interpretation.

This film, though quite lengthy, is captivating and entertaining. Vincent Minnelli's first stab at directing a drama is certainly remarkable. The emphasis on Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra as hard drinking and brawling gamblers can be off-putting. Viewed in the dated context (the story is set in the late 1940s, although the film was produced in 1959), viewers may consider the times, where similar situations were commonplace. Shirley MacLaine's performance is among her very best. This is an engaging character study that held my attention throughout.

Familiar Fifties UnFairness...

[Xstal · 6/10 · 9 November 2021]

Not a particularly remarkable picture where Frank plays Frank, Dean Plays Dean, although the delightful and beautiful Shirley MacLaine performs as a star - and is an absolute dream.

what a bust

[rupie · 4/10 · 21 January 2003]

[***POSSIBLE SPOILERS***] This movie's reputation precedes it, so it was with anticipation that I sat down to watch it in letterbox on TCM. What a major disappointment.

The cast is superb and the production values are first-rate, but the characters are without depth, the plot is thin, and the whole thing goes on too long. For a movie that deals with alcoholism, family divisions, unfaithfulness, gambling, and sexual repression, the movie is curiously flat, prosaic, lifeless, and cliche-ridden. One example is the portrayal of Frank Hirsch's unfaithfuness: his rather heavy-handed request to his wife to "go upstairs and relax a bit" followed by her predictable pleading of a headache, leads - even more predictably - to his evening liaison with his secretary ("hey Nancy, I've got the blues tonight. Let's go for a drive"), all according to well-worn formula. We don't feel these are real people, but cardboard cutouts acting in a marionette play. Also, the source of the obvious friction between Frank and Dave Hirsch is never really explored or explained. Dave's infatuation with the on-again/off-again Gwen is inexplicable in light of her fatuous inability to defecate or get off the pot. His subsequent marriage of desperation to the Shirley Maclaine/Ginny character is, from the moment of its being presented to this viewer, anyway, obviously doomed to fail, and it was clear - by the conventions of this type of soap opera - that it could only be resolved by someone being killed. The moment the jealous lover started running around with the gun I started a bet with myself as to who - Dave or Ginny - would get killed. The whole thing was phony with a capital 'P'.

Having said that, Maclaine's performance and that of Dean Martin are the standouts here. But on the whole I find the movie's interest to be purely that of a period piece of Hollywood history.

"It Might Have Lacked Something In Craftsmanship"

[stryker-5 · 3 December 2000]

Dave Hirsh is through with the army. A drinking binge with his buddies results in Dave being loaded onto a Greyhound bus bound for Parkman, Indiana (his seldom-visited hometown) clutching the few things he has managed to collect - Ginnie the floozie ("that dumb poushover") and a bag containing two bottles of scotch, the tattered manuscript of a love story and Hirsh's beloved copies of Faulkner, Wolfe and Steinbeck. Dave was once a writer of considerable promise. It had not been Dave's intention to revisit Parkman, but now that he's here he decides to hang around for a while. He wants to settle a score with his brother Frank.

The proprietor of a thriving jewellery store and a rising star in the Rotarians, Frank Hirsh is the worst kind of small-town phoney. He is a master of glib sales patter and the vacuous small talk of country club social evenings. Though he would rather die than say so, he doesn't want his kid brother within a hundred miles of Parkman. Dave is bohemian, hedonistic, creative - in other words, thing which threaten scandal. Having to socialise with Dave (folks would gossip if he shunned his own brother), Frank spends the time alternately bragging about his vulgar prosperity and timidly hinting that maybe Dave should move on.

"I'm an expert on tramps," wisecracks Dave (played by Frank Sinatra). Typically of Ol' Blue Eyes' projects of the period ("Ocean's Eleven", "Come Blow Your Horn") women are depicted as chattles to be despised and traded.

Equally typically, it is from Dean Martin's character that the most virulent misogyny comes. Bama Dillert warns Dave that you either give women orders, or allow them to dominate you. There is no other way. Bama hangs around with Rosalie, the lowlife zombie, and tells Ginnie to "just be a good girl and shut up". It is poor, good-natured Ginnie who gets most of the abuse. "You'll go anywhere with anybody," says her husband-to-be. She is grateful when he allows her to clean the house for him. Edith the nice girl and Dawn the perfect daughter are shown to be whores at heart. Even superior, educated Gwen has her sluttish moments.

Dave's rediscovery of his writing talent is somewhat improbable, as is the volume of whiskey supposedly consumed by these 'real men'. Even more unlikely is Dave's romantic rush of blood to the head near the end of the picture, and the melodramatic consequences which flow from it.

There is a Cahn and Van Heusen theme song, of course ("To Love And Be Loved"). Shirley Maclaine is good as Ginnie the 'escort' with the heart of gold. She tended hereafter to be typecast as a trollop ("Irma La Douce", "Woman Times Seven", "My Geisha", "Sweet Charity", "Two Mules"). The set of the French house is marvellous, with its easy-on-the -eye three-dimensional layout. Martha Hyer as Gwen seems miscast as Frankie's love interest, not least because her head is twice the size of his.

Coming home

[jotix100 · 6/10 · 13 December 2005]

Some films are meant to be seen again and again. Alas, this is not the case with "Some Came Running". The film has a sadly dated look now and all its faults are painfully evident. Vincente Minnelli, a man who distinguished himself in light comedies and musicals, appears to be out of his league here. He is not helped by the adaptation John Patrick and Arthur Sheekman wrote of the James Jones novel.

This film is first, and foremost a glorified soap opera, based on a best seller. Frank Sinatra appears to be completely wrong for the part of David Hirsh, a role that has "Paul Newman" written all over it. Shirley MacLaine, who scored a big success with her Ginny Moorhead is fun to watch, especially in the scene in Terre Haute where she sings off key in front of the band. The third member of the Rat Pack, Dean Martin, makes the best out of Bama Dillbert.

The others in the cast are fine, especially Arthur Kennedy, one of the best actors of that time plays Frank Hirsh, the man that has married into wealth and is now a pillar of the community. Martha Hyer is Gwen, the girl who is too straight laced to compete with the vulgar Ginny.

"Some Came Running" needed some editing because at 137 minutes, it's too long.

stylish 50s melodrama with an A cast

[funkyfry · 9/10 · 8 November 2002]

Remarkable, engrossing 50s melodrama. The story is a simple one; Sinatra plays a G.I. returning home after many years' absence, during which time he's written a few unsuccessful novels and acquired a talent for gambling and drinking. Although he's brought a girl with him (MacLaine, overacting as usual) who adores him, he takes up with the local professor's daughter (Hyer), who believes in his talent and ability but doubts he can stop drinking and sleeping around. Martin is an affable presence as his friend who involves him in his gambling business.

Extraordinary direction of actors, a somewhat tired script being pushed past the point of believability often enough but carefully emotionally anchored by Minnelli's hand. Nice color photography.

a faded snapshot of post-war literary clichés

[mjneu59 · 6/10 · 3 January 2011]

The screen adaptation of James Jones' novel is little more than a transparent, third-person daydream, presenting every writer's inflated image of himself as the tough, honest, alienated, misunderstood, sensitive, handsome stranger who changes the lives of a stereotypical small town community, from the attractive (but sexually repressed) schoolmarm to the dimwitted (but kindhearted) floozy. Most of the actors are likewise typecast: rat-packers Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra (who owed Jones a debt of gratitude for his comeback role in 'From Here to Eternity') do a lot of drinking and card playing; Shirley MacLaine is her usual nutty self; and poor Arthur Kennedy sleepwalks resignedly through his thankless role as the rebel writer's conservative older brother. The film can still be entertaining if seen as a dated post-war soap opera, and here I freely admit my opinions might have been compromised by seeing the film on VHS: the colorful wide-screen production is totally lost in the pan-and-scan video format, leaving the impression that some vital action always occurring just out of frame.

Some Came Running Class Wars At their Best

[edwagreen · 9/10 · 27 December 2005]

***1/2 to this excellent 1958 film.

If ever you wanted to teach about social class differences in American society, you can use this fine film as a perfect example.

Ex-G.I. writer returns home. He is a very good writer, on his way up, but is confused and perplexed about his life.

He has his card playing buddies led by a boozy Dean Martin, in a tour De force performance. Where was the Academy not to nominate Dean in a supporting role? Instead, they gave the nod to veteran excellent actor Arthur Kennedy (memorable in Peyton Place the year before). Kennedy played the writer, Frank Sinatra's conventional brother, who may harbor some skeletons in his own closet.

Along the way, Sinatra meets Miss French, an upper class high school teacher. He also comes into contact with Ginny, marvelously played by Shirley Mac Laine. Ginny is common, and totally uneducated. Her atrocious English plays well up against the writer Dave and Miss French, the prototype of the American teacher.

At the spur of the moment, Dave marries Ginny but tragedy soon ensues.

Some Came Running is a story of moral decay, elite vs. a common person as well as a writer's quest for the meaning of life. It worked awfully well. Mac Laine was nominated for best actress; Martha Hyer's Miss French deservedly awarded her an Oscar nomination as best supporting actress.

Dated & Cliche-Ridden, but Entertaining

[theognis-80821 · 7/10 · 7 June 2021]

Frank Sinatra plays a two-fisted tough guy, in 1946 home from the war, who visits his hectoring, moralizing brother, a role Arthur Kennedy pioneered in "Champion" and "The Man From Laramie." After being spurned by high-toned, bourgeois teacher Martha Hyer, who, like any woman of the 1950s that had not started producing a brood of future warriors, appears to be "frigid," Frank goes to Smitty's Tavern, where easy, beautiful, lower class Shirley MacLaine instantly falls in love with him. When Kennedy is rejected by his wife, formidable Leora Dana, who has had all the children she's going to have, he goes after the "girl" in his office, pretty Nancy Gates. When his teenaged daughter, Betty Lou Keim sees this, she is shocked into disillusionment, gets drunk and goes on a "date" with hapless, middle-aged Don Haggerty, until our swaggering hero runs him off, thus rescuing the distressed maiden. Frank is brutal in his mistreatment of "fallen" Shirley, but in the end, she can't get "enough," has her own lesson to teach and proves her love. All this happens before Hugh M. Hefner's 1960s "Sexual Revolution." The cinematography, music and direction are all very good and the final scene in the amusement park is as memorable for the career of Vincente Minelli as the fun house shootout in "The Lady From Shanghai," for Orson Welles, although technically far less challenging.

Great Super Stars

[whpratt1 · 8/10 · 12 September 2007]

Never viewed this film and was very surprised at the great acting by Shirley MacLaine, ( Ginnie Moorehead ) who found herself on a bus with her one night stand an Army Soldier named Dave Hirsh (Frank Sinatra) who is so bombed with booze he almost misses his bus stop in a small Indiana town. As soon as Dave Hirsh gets into the town he starts a bundle of trouble, because his brother Frank Hirsh, ( Arthur Kennedy ), is a very successful man and is highly respected, however, he is not liked by his brother Frank who has not seen him for many years. Dave Hirsh was a writer who had written about two books and also had another book he would like to have published. Ginnie Moorehead who has been around the block a few times, likes Dave Hirsh and he in turn likes her also, but knows her past and is looking for a woman with character and class. Gwen French, (Martha Hyer) has read Dave Hirsh's books and he begins to fall in love with her because she is a teacher who teaches literature and wants him to publish his book and gives him confidence in himself. There is plenty of laughs with Dean Martin, (Bama Dilert) who is a gambler and heavy boozer. Great Classic Film,enjoy.

It's Shirley's picture

[vigcyn-665-195614 · 6/10 · 13 December 2013]

This is a rather engrossing movie despite some stilted dialogue and humdrum performances. Frank Sinatra plays Dave Hirsh, a writer down on his luck, who returns to his hometown after a stint in the army. Like all writers depicted in the 1950's, he drinks a lot and is fatalistic to the degree that he marries a known tramp (brilliantly played by Shirley MacLaine) when the woman he really loves (Martha Hyer) spurns him because he isn't solid husband material.

The best I can say about Sinatra's performance is that he's adequate. It would have been far more exciting to see how Marlon Brando would have pulled off this role. Dean Martin as Hirsh's buddy, Bama, a small time gambler, is entertaining as usual, but it's Shirley who brings the film to life and makes it worth watching.

She plays Ginnie Moorehead, a truly luckless girl, who is nonetheless, the kindest, most sympathetic character in the whole movie. It's clear she's known nothing, but tough breaks since the day she was born, but her determination to show everyone "a good time" makes her valiant.

Superb "melodrama" with a deep spiritual-and theological -subtext.

[coop-16 · 10/10 · 28 May 2013]

Godard, Scorsese- and Linklater- show their taste with their admiration for this rich, complex, and profoundly misunderstood film. Adapted from James Jones' overblown 1200 page follow-up to From Here To Eternity, this is one of the best examples of that misunderstood fifties sub genre, the the romantic melodrama/"dramedy", which was brilliantly practiced by Ray, Minelli, Sirk-and, even, sometimes,Robert Aldrich and Delmer Daves . Like the decade which produced them, these films are sadly misunderstood. The Fifties are stereotyped as "the bland leading the bland", however, a closer study of the decade shows inner tensions and paradoxes.Neither Eisenhower nor his decade were "bland " at all, but rather, rich in layers of tragedy and ambiguity, coupled with a suppressed restlessness and undefined spiritual longing in the midst of outward smug prosperity. Similarly, the glossy surface of fifties melodrama conceals profound tensions. On the surface, this films are just melodramatic "glossies", but a closer viewing shows extraordinary power and even depth. In part, this is due to acting that can only be described as excellent. The cast is close to superb. The main cast is divided into two camps; ; Three "rat packers" and f"respected TV stage and movie veterans. The rat packers are Sinatra and his trashy, vulgar pals, Dino and Shirley. Sinatra shows nuances of compassion and sensitivity through the smallest gesture or turn of phrase. Dean Martin, always wearing a not quite pure white hat, is far better than his reputation, playing a doomed small time gambler /hustler quite well. Shirley Mclaine's character, her hair a red crows nest, is a pig, a slut, a drunk,a dummy, and and a floozy. She is also a gentle, sad, human with a soul who truly longs for love, and -who knows-salvation.. They are the Films " Low-life" characters- its "sinners". The other characters are more or less "pharisees"- outwardly respectable but inwardly problematic. They are played by five excellent performers: Arthur Kennedy, Martha Hyer, Nacy Gates, Larry Gates, and Leora Dana. The last three were recurrent faces in fifties and sixties television. They were in EVERYTHING; Alfred Hitchcock Presents, The Twilight Zone, Playhouse 90, Naked City, Route 66, The Defenders, Slattery's People, Channing, etc. Kennedy is excellent as Sinatra's estranged small town Babbitt of a brother., a weak and confused man, who alternates between genuine love of his bother, for his " scandalous " behavior, and envy of his honesty. Martha Hyer offers a rich performance as Sinatra's "nice" girlfriend. Despite her love for Franks character and her sincere desire to awaken his talent. she too no more understands him than Shirley does. This is shown by the scene in the classroom. In response to a students question, she goes into a remarkable soliloquy about the moral flaws of great writers , and how these flaws reflect their passion, their appetite for life. While these flaws should not be emulated, they also do not detract from the writers achievements, or lessen their humanity. Then, class is dismissed, and who should walk in but Ginny Moorehead, in all her trashy vulnerability. Hyer pretends to be compassionate and understanding, but instead sees in the poor B-girl every one of her lovers flaws. It is not until Ginny Sacrifices herself at the end that she perceives her essential goodness-and the goodness in Frank's character as well. Finally, there are Larry Gates, Nancy Gates(no relation) and Leora Dana. Larry Gates, who also played the peace-loving Missionary in The Sand Pebbles and the bigoted Fat Cat in The Heat of The night, is very good here as a perceptive and intelligent Small Town/Small college who understands Sinatra's character better than everyone else but remains very much a small town, small college, professor. Nacy Gates is solid as Arthur Kennedy 's girlfriend, who longs to flee Parkman and its insular hypocrisy. Finally, Leora Dana is great as Kennedy's Social climbing wife, who despises Sinatra's character- but still wants to use his literary reputation to inflate her own standing in the community. . The Production design is beautiful-as can be expected in any Minnelli film. In addition, Bernstein's score is driving , bluesy, and occasionally perfectly overwrought. The next to last sequence is Cinemascope at its highest. Finally, there is the subtext of the film. Probably, few who watch it nowadays grasp that the title is taken from The Gospel Of Mark. The "some" who "came running" are the sinners who came "running" to hear Jesus preach. The story , therefore, is implicitly about the search redemption, and about those who, for all their surface sleaziness, would "come running" if they were to actually hear the gospel: failed writers who hang out in dives, dying Gamblers with cirrhosis of the liver, Barroom searching for love. In short, A great film. Not quite an "Eleven", but at least a Nine and a Half teetering on the margin of ten, and sometimes toppling over.

So-So Soaper

[kenjha · 7/10 · 16 July 2010]

Soldier comes back to his small home town in Indiana after the war and disrupts some lives. Sinatra is solid as the disgruntled soldier and former writer. MacLaine is wonderful as a dim-witted floozy that swoons after Sinatra, who inexplicably wants to marry Hyer after spending a few hours with her. Sinatra's interest in Hyer, an attractive but cold-hearted and stuck-up schoolteacher, is never believable. Kennedy is fine as Sinatra's brother while Martin barely registers in an unsubstantial role. The finale feels contrived and out of place, an indication that Minnelli was out of his comfort zone with this material. Good score by Bernstein.

go-nowhere, post-war fatalism

[onepotato2 · 2/10 · 29 November 2009]

Vincente Minelli movies are usually worth your time; Meet Me in St Louis, The Bad and the Beautiful. I awaited this movie with great interest. But what a disappointment.

Some Came Running is scene after scene of go-nowhere fatalism. Sinatra is a sad sack, returned from the war to find disappointing family relationships, a disappointing floozy hanging on him, living in disappointing digs as a gal persuades him to finish his disappointing writing project. The movie has a big dramatic finish in which a disappointing villain catches up with Sinatra and MacClane and something disappointing happens. The sequence is intended to be tension-filled but Minelli is no Hitchcock; he gets so distracted by pretty colors, he doesn't notice the scene is a wheezing cliché and the characters are so thinly-drawn and poorly developed we don't particularly care that they get shot. (especially MacClane) But that's the only real cinematography in the project. Otherwise we look at constipated characters standing around bars & living rooms getting on each others nerves for two hours. Hell IS other people, apparently.

There is nothing going on in this movie. The dilemma of soldiers returning to displacement and indifference after WW2 is handled more deftly in 'The Best Years of Our Lives.' And either of two Inge products, 'Splendor in the Grass' and 'Picnic' covers the desperation of being trapped in a dead-end town, with much more poignance.