12 years ago this month Ol' Blue Eyes checked out. This is my koo-koo tribute to Frankie and his wild, knocked-out, groovy cinematic oeuvre.
Suddenly, the Man with the Golden Arm (not The Oscar) was Out on the Town with all the Guys and Dolls in High Society getting Higher and Higher and feeling Young at Heart. Take me Out to the Ball Game, he demanded, then took the Road to Hong Kong and went Around the World in Eighty Days on Von Ryan’s Express, traveling From Here to Eternity with The List of Adrian Messenger which read: Ocean’s Eleven, Robin and the 7 Hoods, Sergeants 3, and 4 for Texas, those latter 4 being: Pepe, Dirty Dingus Magee, Pal Joey, and Tony Rome. All of them wanted to be The Manchurian candidate but only Some Came Running and none were dancing the Can-can. Not as a Stranger he prepared to Meet Danny Wilson but instead Johnny Concho showed up. With his Marriage on the Rocks and Never so Few on his Carousel, Johnny called The Detective who found a Lady in Cement and assumed there’d been an Assault on a Queen. He needed that like A Hole in the Head so he set The Tender Trap to catch The Naked Runner whom he suspected was also The Kissing Bandit, and wouldn’t that be Double Dynamite? Meanwhile The Devil at 4 O’clock declared The Pride and the Passion to be The First Deadly Sin which Cast a Giant Shadow over The Miracle of the Bells and Cannonball Run II. And while It Happened in Brooklyn, he declared: Meet me in Las Vegas in The House I Live In because that’s where None but the Brave and Kings Go Forth. Till the Clouds Roll By, Come Blow Your Horn and Step Lively, for The Joker is Wild. Anchors Away.
Every single movie that Sinatra made - good, bad, ugly - is in the above paragraph.
