Frank Sinatra Movies

Frank Sinatra is best known for his wonderful singing voice....but his movie career is pretty impressive too!

Frank Sinatra is best known for his wonderful singing voice….but his movie career is pretty impressive too!

Want to know the best Frank Sinatra movies?  How about the worst Frank Sinatra movies?  Curious about Frank Sinatra’s box office grosses or which Frank Sinatra movie picked up the most Oscar® nominations? Need to know which Frank Sinatra movie got the best reviews from critics and audiences and which got the worst reviews? Well you have come to the right place….because we have all of that information.

Talk about procrastinating!  I originally got a request to do a Frank Sinatra movie page almost three years ago by Earle1670 from HubPages.  Frank was bumped many times….but finally “The Chairman of the Board” has his very own UltimateMovieRankings page.

Frank Sinatra (1915-1998) was an American actor, director and of course singer.  He won a Best Supporting Oscar® for his performance in From Here To Eternity.  On this page we will be only looking at Sinatra’s movie career.  Despite being in the shadows of his singing career…he managed to put together a pretty successful movie career. Including 20 movies that crossed the magical $100 million mark when looking at adjusted domestic box office dollars.

His IMDb page shows 65 acting credits from 1941-1987. This page will rank 46 Frank Sinatra movies from Best to Worst in six different sortable columns of information. Television appearances, some of his movies made outside of the Hollywood system and his straight to DVD movies were not included in the rankings.

Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra, Peter Lawford and Sammy Davis Jr. in 1960's Ocean's Eleven

Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra, Peter Lawford and Sammy Davis Jr. in 1960’s Ocean’s Eleven

Frank Sinatra Movies Ranked In Chronological Order With Ultimate Movie Rankings Score (1 to 5 UMR Tickets) *Best combo of box office, reviews and awards.

Frank Sinatra Movies Can Be Ranked 6 Ways In This Table

The really cool thing about this table is that it is “user-sortable”. Rank the movies anyway you want.

  • Sort Frank Sinatra movies by co-stars of his movies
  • Sort Frank Sinatra movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost
  • Sort Frank Sinatra movies by yearly box office rank
  • Sort Frank Sinatra movies how they were received by critics and audiences.  60% rating or higher should indicate a good movie
  • Sort by how many Oscar® nominations and how many Oscar® wins each Frank Sinatra movie received.
  • Sort Frank Sinatra movies by Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score.  UMR Score puts box office, reviews and awards into a mathematical equation and gives each movie a score.

Stats and Possibly Interesting Things From The Above Frank Sinatra Table

  1. Twenty-eight Frank Sinatra movies crossed the magical $100 million domestic gross mark.  That is a percentage of 60.86% of his movies listed. From Here to Eternity (1953) was his biggest box office hit.
  2. An average Frank Sinatra movie grosses $132.40 million in adjusted box office gross.
  3. Using RottenTomatoes.com’s 60% fresh meter.  26 Frank Sinatra movies are rated as good movies…or 56.52% of his movies. Manchurian Candidate (1962) is his highest rated movie while The Pride and the Passion (1957) is his lowest rated movie.
  4. Eighteen Frank Sinatra movies received at least one Oscar® nomination in any category…..or 39.13% of his movies.
  5. Four Frank Sinatra movies won at least one Oscar® in any category…..or 8.69% of his movies.
  6. A “good movie” Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score is 60.00. 32 Frank Sinatra movies scored higher that average….or 69.56% of his movies.  From Here to Eternity (1953) got the the highest UMR Score while First Deadly Sin (1980) got the lowest UMR Score.
Frank Sinatra in 1962's The Manchurian Candidate

Frank Sinatra in 1962’s The Manchurian Candidate

Possibly Interesting Facts About Frank Sinatra

1.  Francis Albert Sinatra was born and raised in born in Hoboken, New Jersey.

2.  Frank Sinatra’s voice carried him into movies.  In the 1930s and 1940s Sinatra went from a saloon singer, to a band singer, to working with musical greats Harry James and Tommy Dorsey.  As he gained more notoriety in the music world he started landing cameo singing roles in movies  By the mid 1940s, he was starring in blockbuster movies.

3.  Frank Sinatra had many nicknames…here are the most famous:  The Voice, Chairman of the Board, Ol’ Blue Eyes, Swoonatra, The Sultan of Swoon and La Voz.  Frank Sinatra has an incredible 321 (and counting) soundtrack credits on IMDb and has sold over 150 million records (and counting) in the world.

4.  Frank Sinatra was married four times.   His first marriage was to Nancy Barbato from 1939-1951…they had 3 children (singer actress Nancy Sinatra, singer Frank Jr. and Christina Sinatra) together.  His second marriage was to actress Ava Gardner 1951-1957.  His third marriage was to actress Mia Farrow 1966-1968.  His final marriage was to writer Barbara Marx 1976-1998 (his death).

5.  After Frank Sinatra’s movies Meet Danny Wilson (1951) and Double Dynamite (1951) bombed at the box office he got the dreaded label “box office poison”.  Around this time From Here To Eternity was being cast.  Sinatra really wanted to play the Angela Maggio role.  The producer of the movie was strongly against using Sinatra and cast Eli Wallach in the role.  However when filming started Sinatra had the role.  There are many theories on how Sinatra got the role….my favorite is the Hollywood legend that parts of The Godfather are based on Frank Sinatra…..the “offer he can’t refuse” part.

6.  Frank Sinatra turned down or was seriously considered for the following roles:  On The Waterfront (Marlon Brando part), North by Northwest (Cary Grant part), Dirty Harry (Clint Eastwood part), Death Wish (Charles Bronson part), The Odd Couple (Walter Matthau part), The Graduate (Mr. Robinson), The Music Man (Robert Preston part), and Flaming Star (Elvis Presley).  A part Sinatra really wanted to play but did not get was the Marlon Brando role in The Godfather.

7.  Frank Sinatra did many cameo roles in his career.  Blink and you might have missed him in Cannonball Run 2, The Oscar, The Road To Hong Kong, The List of Adrian Messenger, Around the World in Eighty Days, Meet Me In Las Vegas and Cast A Giant Shadow.

8.  In 1963 his son was kidnapped. The kidnappers told Frank Sr. to call them from pay phones. During one call he ran out of coins, and briefly feared that it had cost him his son (the kidnappers gave him another chance). He paid the $250,000 ransom, Frank Jr. was returned, and the kidnappers were eventually caught. However, as a result of the payphone scare, Sinatra swore never to be caught without dimes again, and carried a roll of dimes with him constantly until his death.

9.  Frank Sinatra was listed in Quigley Publications’ Top Ten Box Office Stars in 1956 (10th), 1957 (5th), 1958 (10th), 1959 (7th),1960 (8th), and 1962 (8th).  19 of his movies grossed over $100 million when looking at adjusted for inflation box office numbers.  Check out Frank Sinatra’s movie career compared to current and classic actors.  Most 100 Million Dollar Movies of All-Time.

10.  Three more quick facts:  Frank Sinatra’s last starring role, The First Deadly Sin, was Bruce Willis‘ first ever movie appearance.  When Bela Lugosi died broke….Frank Sinatra paid for his funeral.  Frank Sinatra’s epitaph on his tombstone says “The Best Is Yet To Come”.

Check out Frank Sinatra‘s career compared to current and classic actors.  Most 100 Million Dollar Movies of All-Time.

Steve’s Frank Sinatra You Tube Video

Academy Award® and Oscar® are the registered trademarks of the Academy of Motion Arts and Sciences.  Golden Globes® are the registered trademark and service mark of the Hollywood Foreign Press. 

90 thoughts on “Frank Sinatra Movies

  1. HI BRUCE
    1 Apart from the Duke and Mumbles Sinatra is the artist about whom I have collected the most anecdotes and items of trivia down the years but I’ve mentioned most of them already on this site. However I was pouring over my notes and did come across a film historian’s interview with an actress who would not be named but said that in her experience Frankie despite his “hell-raiser” image*** was the “tenderest lover” whom she had ever dated.
    *** [MARTIN: You haven’t been yourself lately Frank. SINATRA Why not Dean? DINO You haven’t hit anybody all week!

    2 I have mentioned before but it’s worth repeating that Sinatra was among only four mainstream Hollywood stars to make Time magazine’s perceived 100 Greatest people of the 20th century, the other 3 being Chaplin, Monroe and Mr M. I suppose that it could therefore be argued that Frankie has been the most successful personality to combine singing AND acting careers in history, with Elvis for example not having as strong an acting career as Sinatra and perhaps Crosby being the only other serious contender. My two ladies Doris and Streisand along with Judy might be in the running for the accolade most successful singing/acting female artist with Jeanette MacDonald and my Deanna also maybe being there or thereabouts.

  2. 1 I’m not watching your videos in any special order but after Bing and Dean it HAD to be Frankie. He was another of those stars who attracted a lot of publicity but often for unflattering reasons. A concerned friend is reported to have said to him once “Are you not well Frank? you haven’t hit anybody all week.”

    2 However whatever one’s personal opinion of him he is perceived in many quarters as one of the greatest if not THE greatest of entertainers of all time. Time magazine considered him as one of only 4 Hollywood stars who merited being included in its “100 Greatest People of the 20th Century.” the other 3 being Chaplin, Mumbles and Monroe. You possibly may have reasonably selected 4 different ones but to be a contender for inclusion in that kind of frame at all at least shows how highly Frankie was rated in his career.

    3 I preferred him as a movie star to a singer and his films career falls into 3 broad parts – his initial rise to stardom and then brief decline before From here to Eternity; from that movie until the late 50s when Bing marvelled at Frank’s “climb” back;m and from 1959 until 1968 when Tracy observed that Frank had more power in Hollywood than many of the old studio moguls.

    4 I note that you have selected just 4 films from the 1st period the other 26 being split fairly evenly between the 2nd and 3rd phases. You and Our Leader [for critic/audience] are virtually in sync in your top 6 selections though YOU agree with me that From Here to Eternity should be 1st whilst Bruce places it 3rd and opts for Manchurian Candidate as tops.

    5 Unfortunately I am at odds with the pair of you about Manchurian Candidate because whilst I used to like it I have since seen the Washington/Streep 2004 version and I feel it makes the Frankie movie look rather dated. However the Sinatra original did have one advantage – the lovely Janet Leigh !

    6 ‘Oscar’ for best poster reproduction in your Sinatra video – 3-way tie between Kings Go Forth. Pride and Passion and Guys & Dolls.

    Have a good weekend BOB

    1. The Manchurian Candidate, I much prefer the original, is a film I revisit often but I’m glad From Here to Eternity won the top spot, it isn’t as nasty as Manchurian.. but on the other hand two of the main stars are dead by the end of Eternity so it’s not exactly a happy film.

      So who was the greatest entertainer of the 20th century? Frankie? Bing? Elvis? The Beatles? Abba? For a few years in the 1980s Michael Jackson was the most popular entertainer on the planet but his star started to fade by the 1990s.

        1. The Beatles were enormous and their albums still sell, but than so does Elvis. How do you gauge such a thing, longevity? mass appeal? relevance? artistry? cultural impact? all of the above?

  3. Bruce
    I meant to say that I never knew that

    (a) Frankie was after Godpop. I’m surprised that he never got it because I read that Paramount consulted a mob representative about the authenticity of elements of the film and that the rep sat in on for example the shooting of the scene where Don C is shot while purchasing fruit. If Frankie had got the role Johnny Fontane probably would have been the hero of the film and he would have got to slap his father ! I read (maybe somewhere in your Possibly Interesting Facts) that Nicholson was after the Pacino part.

    (b) Frankie was offered Mr Robison. I did read -maybe from you again – that Doris was offered the part of Mrs Robison. If she had played the part exactly the way Mrs Mel Brooks performed it Rock would have turned in his grave !!!

    2 Thanks again for the additional info.

    1. Hey Bob
      (a) The Godfather would have been different for sure. I think in an alternate universe there is a Godfather movie that has a cast of Laurence Olivier, Dustin Hoffman, Frank and Peter Falk….all who were considered for parts in this universe.
      (b) I will take credit for that…especially if nobody else is….lol.
      (c) You are welcome.

      1. BRUCE

        1 Well if there is a parallel universe and I’m ever allowed into it I would like to see there Frank and Doris as Mr and Mrs Robinson just to contrast it with their previous pairing as ‘young sweethearts’ in the 1954 Young at Heart. [PS an excellent movie]

        2 I remember back in the 70s decade telling a fellow buff that Brando and Larry had both been considered for Godpop at one stage and reports were that when Larry withdrew Lee J Cobb and Ernest Borgnine threw their hat in the ring. Like you my pal had an enormously broad and deep knowledge of movies and he sneered “Huh! If they were looking at people of the calibre of Brando and Olivier, Cobb and Borgnine had no chance even if Brando too had withdrawn.”

        3 It won’t be long until your well-deserved hols. I am reminded of the Buddy Holly song-
        “Everyday it’s a gettin’ closer
        Moving faster that a roller-coaster

        BOB

        1. Hey Bob.
          1. A Frank and Doris reunion would have been interesting…..as well as Tom Selleck as Indiana Jones, Steve McQueen as Superman and Humphrey Bogart and Clark Gable in the 1954 John Huston classic The Man Who Would Be King.
          2. Good point.
          3. Yep….we were just telling the kids….that this time in 3 days we will be on vacation.
          Cogerson 🙂

        1. I mean you said something about and I quote “would like to see Doris and Frank as Mr. and Mrs. Robison”

          I thought you were talking about the Graduate where the last name is “Robinson” as in

          Here’s to you Mrs. Robinson
          Jesus Loves You More……

          You wrote down the spelling of MY name of R O B I S O N.

        2. Robinson or Robison it is all pretty close…I image lots of people have tried to put an “n” in your name.

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