THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN ARM

New Zealand Listener, Volume 35, Issue 899, 26 October 1956, Page 18

THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN ARM

(Otto Preminger-United Artists) 16 years and over EVERYBODY'S an habitual something, says Molly from the seedy night club, defending her alcoholic boy friend to the reformed dope addict she loves; and if I were not an habitual filmgoer The Man with the Golden Arm is, for all its horror, the sort of movie that might hook me. From the start Otto Preminger, who made it from Nelson Algren’s novel, handles his material with a hypnotist’s skill. Under menacing credit titles by Saul Bass a jazzy, disturbing theme by Elmer Bernstein plays, and before the sordid, sinister, unhealthy fascinating setting is even on the screen you're under its spell. Frank Sinatra the actor, as good as he has ever been (or better), is the dope addict Frankie, home from a cure 'to the frighteningly real neurotic invalid (Eleanor Parker), his wife. He has married her because he blamed himself for her accident; she-a dependent, selfpitying shrike-holds him captive by the pretence that she can’t walk. Down stairs is the warm devotion of Molly (Kim Novak), whose best scenes with Frankie relieve with real tenderness a generally stark narrative. In the near-by bar wait the poker boss, who wants his golden-armed dealer back, and the pedlar, decadently elegant (an unforgettable Darren McGavin), at whose heels walks the junkie with compulsive gait whenever life crowds in too intolerably. What hope is there for Frankie? This film has been severely criticised but, aware of the devices that help it to compel attention, I still find it, after two visits, brilliant cinema and a worthwhile social. document-a picture not only of drug addiction but of the starting point of other escape routes and of the atmosphere in which they flourish. To the not inconsiderable extent that these touch our own experience the film does more than merely illuminate the seamier side of American big-city life.