Customer Reviews

Stealing Sinatra

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Sometimes truth is indeed stranger than fiction, especially the epilogue. Perhaps it is because it is based on such strange facts that it resists being fictionalized. "Stealing Sinatra" registers as flat. What a waste. I think that its biggest problem is it neglects to include some of the more interesting facts of the story. Why did Barry Keenan do it? The movie shows him popping pills but it does not mention (if memory serves) that he was once a great mind and the youngest person to trade on the stock exchange. It does mention his maraculous rebound in the end, but does not mention that kidnapper and kidnapee are often forced to exchange awkward glances at ritzy parties. All and all it is an adequate film, due mostly to the way it evokes its time period, and of course the remarkable skill of William H. Macy.

This movie isn't for everybody, but I enjoyed it thoroughly. It probably helped that I grew up in the L.A. area, and the San Fernando valley in particular (I've been to Canoga Park, and driven down Sherman Way!). I loved the way they evoked the Southern CA surf culture, and especially the surf music, of the early 60's. I've always been big a fan of that era. And has anyone noticed how prevalent 60's surf music still is today? You hear it constantly on TV commercials and in the media. The pre-counterculture 60's period detail in this movie was excellent: clothing, cars, houses, hairstyles etc. It's an almost overlooked time in our history and culture. (As a former valley-boy, I was amazed to see on the end credits that this was filmed in Vancouver B.C!). The real-life story here is no secret. The fun of this movie is in the journey, not the destination. I'm glad they chose to make it as an almost surreal, truth-stranger-than-fiction comedy. This is serious subject matter, but it would have been a total flop as a straight ahead drama. The thrill was in getting to know the perpetrators, and in the realization that they were really just regular, likeable guys (guys I might have hung out with at one time) doing incredibly stupid things and getting in deeper and deeper. Of course the glue that held the whole thing together was David Arquette. You can have fun just watching him think. I've followed him, on and off, since the Scream movies, and he just gets interestinger and interestinger. I was mesmerized watching him go from friendly to scheming to salesman to wounded in the time it took to light a cigarette. There's a world of subtlety and nuance on his face. Bill Macy also added depth and dimension to the whole affair and provided a solid foundation for Arquette to stand on. For me, this is an excellent low budget gem, and a movie I never get tired of watching.

Sure, it's a Showtime production, but this low-budget charmer evokes the feel of innocent 1963 pretty well, and the trio of kidnappers does a nice job showing how incompetent the real ones really were. It's got a snappy soundtrack, too. William Macy steals the show as the laconic older kidnapper, constantly advising his cohorts that what they are up to is bad. I'm not clear on the facts of the case and don't know how close this comes to a documentary. Was the guy from Jan & Dean really involved? Very watchable.

Stealing Sinatra is based on a true story. I heard about it on the Chicago based This American Life. Fascinating!
Ira Glass said that Showtime had gotten the rights to the story and made it into a film. Great! I ordered it at once. David Arquette is so terrible, I had to turn it off. Not to mention the direction of this piece of crap is awful. I recommend listening to the podcast of This American Life instead. Arquette should stick to playing retarded sheriffs in horror spoofs.

David Arquette (Scream Trilogy, Stephen King's Riding The Bullet) stars as Barry who has the perfect plan. He wants to kidnap Frank Sinatra Jr., played by Thomas Ian Nicholas (American Pie 1-3, L.A. D.J.) , for ransom of a large amount of money. Coming along for the ride is Barry's friend Joe, played by Ryan Browning (The Smokers, Extreme Days) and Mr. John Irwin, played by the always masterful William H. Macy (Cellular, The Cooler). Macy doesnt think this a brilliant plan but he goes along with it. They kidnap Sinatra Jr. while he was staying in a hotel and bring them back to the place where their gonna keep him. Arquette has Macy take all the phone calls from Frank Sinatra, Sr., played by James Russo so that way they can ask for the ransom money and then when they get it, Jr. will be released. Stealing Sinatra has it moments, it's a TV movie people. Nicholas does a fine job as Sinatra Jr., he sings good too and of course Macy is wonderful but Arquette and Browning are way miscast for their roles. Also starring Evangeline Lilly (Tv's LOST), who was one of those bikini models in that one commercial shoot. Doesnt feel like their was much oomph in this "supposed" comedy...I didnt laugh that much.

William H. Macy steals the show with a performance that sounds like every middle aged drunk with a good heart I've ever known. It's unfortunate that the character got mixed up with these misfits.

James Russo does a pretty good Sinatra swagger.

The girl playing Nancy Sinatra was real cute and did a good job portraying the pre-boots Nancy.

The DVD has lot of good extras including a funny outake real, and a good director commentary tract comparing the movie to the acutal events.

Ugh. Don't waste your time. You may think this is a "movie", but it's just something Showtime threw together. None of the acting is very good, and it has very little, if any, redeeming qualities.
I know, I know, it has "Sinatra" in the title, how bad can it be? Well, it's bad, trust me.
The only thing I liked about it, assuming they stuck to facts, is that you learn what happened to Frank Jr's captors.