The Man with the Golden Arm
United Artists | Release Date: December 15, 1955 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
63
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 10 Critic Reviews
Positive:
5
Mixed:
5
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
90
VarietyStaff (Not Credited)
Clinical in its probing of the agonies, this is a gripping, fascinating film, expertly produced and directed and performed with marked conviction by Frank Sinatra as the drug slave. Read full review
88
LarsenOnFilmJosh Larsen
Director Otto Preminger emphasizes the lurid whenever he can – the neon signs, the smoky interiors, the insinuating bass on the soundtrack – so that the movie plays like a blurry, bleary night-on-its-way-to-morning. Only Sinatra’s talent is clear. Read full review
83
Entertainment WeeklyTim Purtell
Though director Otto Preminger’s decision to use an RKO set instead of Chicago locations initially jars, he makes it work, amping up the claustrophobic tension in beautifully choreographed long takes. Read full review
75
TV Guide MagazineStaff (Not Credited)
Otto Preminger defied the Code with this pioneering look at drug addiction, featuring a stylish rendering of the post-war hipster milieu, a crisp jazz soundtrack, and a remarkable Sinatra. Read full review
70
The New YorkerPauline Kael
Frank Sinatra’s performance is pure gold, but the director, Otto Preminger, goes for sensationalism; the film is effective, but in a garish, hyperbolic, and dated way.
60
Chicago ReaderDave Kehr
The tension is intriguing and expressive (perhaps this is what Beineix had in mind for The Moon in the Gutter), though the unstable mixture is clearly limited as a sustainable style.  Read full review
60
EmpireKim Newman
More Damon Runyan than Irvine Welsh, but as entertaining as it is important. Read full review
60
The New RepublicDelmore Schwartz
The film is a pretty good picture show, as we used to say, but anyone who has read Nelson Algren’s wonderfully poetic novel is likely to make invidious comparisons and be otherwise distracted, particularly when the film strives to narrow itself to a problem of drug addiction.  Read full review
60
Time OutStaff (Not Credited)
Sinatra is excellent as the ex-con junkie trying to make it as a jazz drummer but pulled into a world of pushing, and Kim Novak convinces as his enigmatic mistress; but the casting of Eleanor Parker as his supposedly wheelchair-ridden wife is miscalculated, and Preminger's evocation of the social milieu of the drug user/pusher shows little sign of first-hand observation.  Read full review
40
The New York TimesBosley Crowther
It is a pretty plain and unimaginative looksee at a lower-depths character with a perilous weakness for narcotics that he miraculously overcomes in the end. Read full review
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