The Man with the Golden Arm

The Man with the Golden Arm is a dull morality tale about the dangers of drug addiction, made watchable only by Frank Sinatra’s Oscar-nominated performance as Frankie Machine, a card dealer and heroin addict who wants to get clean and become a drummer. The director, Otto Preminger, had managed to release his 1953 movie The Moon Is Blue without the Hays Code seal of approval, and the movie made money, so when he submitted his script for The Man with the Golden Arm to the Production Code Administration (PCA) and it was rejected, he decided to fight. He ended up releasing the movie while still waiting on the PCA’s decision, arguing that the drug use in the movie is clearly not glamorized. Ultimately, the PCA denied the movie its seal, causing the studio that produced the movie to quit the organization and weakening the power of the Hays Code, which was replaced by the MPAA’s G, PG, R, and X ratings in 1968.

The movie begins with a jazzy Elmer Bernstein song playing over a Saul Bass animated intro. Sinatra as Frankie gets off a bus and greets his old buddy Sparrow, saying “The monkey’s gone.” Frankie goes into his favorite bar and recounts where he’s been the last six months: he got busted for dealing cards in an illegal poker game and got clean in prison rehab with the help of Dr. Lennox. The doctor told Frankie he has “arms made of pure gold,” so he wants to quit dealing cards and become a drummer. Dr. Lennox warned him that if he returns to his old life, he’ll get back into drugs in no time, so he’s changing his life.

We then meet the rest of the people in Frankie’s life. His wife Zosh is a sad, pathetic woman who’s stuck in a wheelchair and constantly nagging Frankie about money and complaining about being in pain. She discourages Frankie from becoming a drummer, preferring that he continue dealing cards even if it’s illegal. We learn her full backstory when a doctor tends to her while she flips through a handmade book labeled “MY SCRAPBOOIT OF FATAL ACCIDENCE.” She says she was in the car when Frankie was driving drunk and got into an accident that put her in the wheelchair. Frankie paces nervously in the background while she happily remembers when he proposed marriage to her right there in the hospital. When nobody’s around, she stands and walks, but quickly sits back down before Frankie can see her.

Schwiefka is Frankie’s old boss, running illegal poker games. Louie is Frankie’s former drug dealer. The two of them work together to try to entice Frankie back into doing heroin and dealing cards. Sparrow is Frankie’s loyal friend, and Frankie demonstrates sleight-of-hand magic tricks to him. Molly is an old girlfriend, and it’s clear they still want to be together. Unlike Zosh, Molly encourages Frankie’s dream of becoming a drummer.

Frankie calls a man that Dr. Lennox knows to see if he can audition for him. Trying to help, Sparrow steals a suit for Frankie to wear, but the cops bust them. Schwiefka visits them in jail and offers to bail them out if Frankie will deal cards for him. Frankie agrees, but he’s craving drugs so much that his hands are shaking and he’s making mistakes. Annoyed with Zosh, nervous about his audition, and unable to deal cards as well as he used to, Frankie knocks on Louie’s door. The jazzy music grows loud and frenetic as Frankie rolls up his sleeve and Louie pulls out each piece of equipment–a spoon, a match, a syringe. Louie says, “Monkey’s never dead, Dealer. The monkey never dies,” and injects Frankie. The camera zooms in on his eyes, which go from agitated to relaxed, and Frankie says, “The monkey will die waiting. He ain’t climbing up on my back no more.”

Later, Frankie tries to practice drumming at home, but Zosh doesn’t like it, so he goes to Molly’s place instead. He confesses that he relapsed but swears he’s going to quit, make enough money to get Zosh well, and then leave her.

Schwiefka and Louie pressure him to deal for a high-stakes game. Frankie agrees to deal for one night only. The game goes on all night, and Frankie is starting to go into withdrawal and begs to go home to get some rest before his audition the next day. Schwiefka pushes him to continue. Louie encourages him to cheat using his sleight-of-hand-tricks, but he’s caught, beaten, and fired. He goes to Louie’s for drugs, but Louie refuses, so Frankie smashes a chair over him. Exhausted and in withdrawal, he goes to his audition, but he bombs due to his shaky hands and miserably slinks off.

Out for revenge, Louie goes to Frankie’s apartment and discovers Zosh alone, standing up. She chases after him, begging him not to say anything and, in desperation, pushes him down the stairs to his death. The cops investigate and suspect Frankie. Frankie goes to Molly, begging for help getting drugs. She says she won’t help him kill himself, removes everything sharp, and locks him in to detox. Frankie spends hours pacing, trying to get out, breaking things, shivering, and pleading, “Molly if you love me, kill me, please.” Eventually, he gets through it, and he and Molly kiss.

He goes home and Zosh warns him that the cops are looking for him. He insists he didn’t do it. He feels guilty for hurting her but he’s leaving her and will send her money because “It’s not that I wanna leave. I gotta leave.” Zosh gets up and chases after him right when Molly and the cops show up. Realizing she’s been caught, she desperately runs to the fire escape and falls over the edge. Frankie tends to her as Zosh declares her love for him before dying. Frankie and Molly walk away together, leaving their old lives behind.

The Hays Code stated that “Illegal drug traffic must never be presented,” and PCA director Joseph I. Breen, who single-handedly censored movies for a decade, warned, “In view of the fact that this dope addiction problem is basic to this story, we suggest you dismiss any further consideration of this material for a motion picture to be made within the Code.” Even though the movie shows drug use as destructive and has a long, unpleasant scene of a major Hollywood star going through withdrawal, there was no way around these strict rules. Otto Preminger used his well-known reputation as a bully with a violent temper to fight against these ridiculous restrictions. It’s too bad he didn’t also make an interesting movie.

VERDICT: GUILTY