The Rat Pack |  | Director: Rob Cohen
Actors: Ray Liotta, Joe Mantegna, Don Cheadle, Angus Macfadyen, William Petersen
Studio: Home Box Office (HBO)
Category: DVD
List Price: $5.98
Buy Used: $1.93
as of 3/19/2010 15:17 EDT details
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Rating:  45 reviews
Sales Rank: 11623
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC
Languages: English (Original Language), Spanish (Original Language), English (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled), French (Subtitled)
Region: 1
Discs: 1
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Number Of Discs: 1
Running Time: 120 Minutes
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.2
Dimensions (in): 7.4 x 5.2 x 0.6
MPN: HBOD91551D
ISBN: 078311432X
UPC: 026359155123
EAN: 9780783114323
ASIN: 630521056X
Theatrical Release Date: August 22, 1998
Release Date: December 22, 1998
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Amazon.com essential video
Hey, chicky baby--it's a cuckoo thing, ya dig? You, too, will find yourself speaking Rat Pack lingo after watching this made-for-HBO biopic about that brief and shining moment when Camelot met Hoboken-on-the-Pacific. The film does a good job of capturing the heady, anything-goes feel of the late-1950s, early-1960s era when Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, and their running buddies ruled Hollywood, Las Vegas, and, it seemed, the world. The story centers on Sinatra's relationship with John F. Kennedy (William F. Petersen) before and after he was elected president. It's not particularly flattering to either man, as Sinatra pimps Kennedy into a relationship with Judith Campbell, at the same time she was the favorite consort of mob boss Sam Giancana. Ray Liotta is a forceful Sinatra (though it's not much of an impression); Joe Mantegna has the look and the sound of the surprisingly sober Dean Martin; and Don Cheadle does a great job as the racially conflicted Sammy Davis Jr. Not great cinema but it's never less than engrossing. --Marshall Fine
Product Description
Dramatization of the life and exploits of the "Rat Pack" consisting of Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Jr., Peter Lawford and Joey Bishop during the 50's and 60's when they ruled Las Vegas.
Item Type: DVD Movie
Item Rating: NR
Street Date: 05/03/05
Wide Screen: no
Director Cut: no
Special Edition: no
Language: ENGLISH
Foreign Film: noSubtitles: no
Dubbed: no
Full Frame: yes
Re-Release: no
Packaging: Sleeve
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| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 45
Wine, Women, Song, Politics, Race, Organized Crime - good times. March 8, 2010
Eve Galewitz (Connecticut, USA)
It was 1960 just before everything changed for good and Frank Sinatra experiencing a career renaissance was the king of tinsletown. L.A., Palm Springs & especially Vegas were his playgrounds and only the very lucky were allowed to play in his sandbox. Besides best buddies & hollywood legends, Dino & Sammy, mafia figures such as Mickey Cohn & Sam "Momo" Giancanna were counted among his friends. These were the guys Sinatra remained loyal to despite the damage to his career & reputation, because they gave him a break when his voice ruptured & his singing career, & marriage went south, and flipping them the bird was, let's face it, lethal. Sinatra spotted a winner & a fellow lothario, in young Senator John Kennedy and hoped to better his image by hooking his wagon to Kennedy's charismatic star.
Like most bio-pics you can't take them literally; and The Rat Pack recreates scenes of many rumored events, that nobody is left alive to confirm either way. However, Sinatra's character has been widely spoken of & written about enough by friends & associates over the years, that it does not take a giant stretch of imagination to imagine him taking a swing at a reporter who called him a "Mama's boy" or providing women to visiting politicians or mafioso. On the other hand, Sinatra was the same guy that stood up for Sammy Davis, Jr., when he received death threats for is marriage to Mai Britt, and gave funds for a new building at Hebrew University in Israel. And of course there was the voice that captured heartache, triumph, and longing for generations of people around the world. Ray Liotta, not the obvious choice, but a good one nonetheless was note perfect in his portrayal of this multi-dimensional man we called "ol blue eyes".
Joe Montegna did a fine job as the enigmatic Dean Martin, the guy we all thought we knew, but didn't. Instead of knocking them back at the bar with, in the parlance of the time, two broads on each arm, Dino was in fact sipping apple juice onstage and flying solo until he got back home to Jeannie & the 7 kids in L.A.
The film did an excellent job showing that Sammy Davis, Jr. dealt with virulent racism when on tour and the not-so-subtle racist humor on the Las Vegas stage, all with an eye to the future when African-American performers would not have to contend with this kind of bigotry. Don Cheadle was a stand-out, especially in the dance numbers which were reminiscent of Fosse's bio-pic "All That Jazz".
Lastly, Angus Macfadyen accomplished the difficult task of portraying Peter Lawford's frustration, as he became a pawn & messenger boy for Sinatra and the Kennedy's. His frustration finally bursting out when he declares "I just want to act and cheat on my wife.".
Another classy production by HBO - highly recommend.
 Frank and the Pack!! November 7, 2009
MARCOLA (Somewhere in Time...)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
A very sad story about Frank Santra trying to help JFK get elected and after JFK got elected, he basicly turing his back on Frank Sinatra.
And people wonder what happened to JFK, Sinatra had ties to the Mafia.
That should tell you everything you need to know, you should never bite
the hand that feeds you!!
Sounds just like a Democrap!!
I rate this movie a 5 of 5 stars!!
 Close but no cigar October 26, 2008
G. Schneider (VA United States)
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Last night I watched THE RAT PACK, starring Ray Liotta as Frank Sinatra, Joe Mantegna as Dean Martin and Don Cheadle as Sammy Davis, Jr. In some cases it seems they were going for physical resemblance, in others, vocal impressions and accents, and yet in others, merely hairstyles. In the case of Ray Liotta as Frank Sinatra, there doesn't seem to be much of any resemblance. Joe Mantegna looked too old for the Dean Martin of that time period. Don Cheadle as Sammy Davis was much too tall, but did a terrific job. William Peterson didn't look anything like JFK.
The portrait painted of Sinatra, Kennedy and others, is hardly flattering, regardless of the truth involved. In other cases (such as Dean Martin's isolation from the group or Peter Lawford's basically emasculated non-role other than as messenger boy between the Kennedys and Sinatra) is probably more accurate than any of the principles would like to have admitted. It's not a pretty picture, although it's marginally entertaining.
The producers obviously couldn't get (or afford) the rights to the original recordings of Sinatra, Davis or Martin, and the actors portraying those artists couldn't do their own vocals (with the exception of Angus MacFadyen as Peter Lawford), so ghost voices were hired, though they weren't given specific screen credit until the list of songs used on the soundtrack came up, which indicated the performers' names. In any event, they weren't particularly good. (The Dean Martin sound-alike missed notes on "Ain't That a Kick in the Head" that Martin would never have done.)
In all, I found it flawed but occasionally fun. And it filled in some blanks regarding the politics of that time.
happy customer December 29, 2007
Deborah Jachelski (Maryland)
I am very pleased with my DVD. It came around the time they said it would and plays good. I am quite happy with it.
This Movie Swings (in spite of itself) October 1, 2007
The JuRK (Our Vast, Cultural Desert)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
This movie has several things about it that almost kill it.
I love the cast but...how do you have someone play Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin? Ray Liotta and Joe Mantegna are great actors but they're playing the Coolest King Giants of Vegas, Baby. Liotta still has that lethal edge from GOODFELLAS that he gives Sinatra a sinister presence he may or may not have had (temper, yes, but Liotta probably does violence a lot better than Frank could, sorry). And as much as I love Joe Mantegna, he fluctuates the amount of dashing Dino charm he can channel in his scenes.
Then there's the singing. Did one guy do all the singing? The Frank and Dean songs all kind of sound like one guy. I know the Sinatra family kept the filmmakers from using any original recordings but couldn't they have found any of the Vegas Rat Pack impersonators to crack at the songs?
(I saw an interview with the late Phil Hartman and he talked about how the Sinatra daughters threatened to withhold the rights to Frank for a Nestea commercial if they used Hartman to dub the voice, so I know they can be very sensitive about that kind of thing. The girls were offended at Hartman's take on Frank but I thought he was hilarious).
In spite of all this, I really enjoyed THE RAT PACK. Don Cheadle does an outstanding job as Sammy Davis Jr. while the rest of the cast is great. The script is fast-moving and covers a lot of ground, focusing on Frank's relationship with JFK but including Vegas shows, Hollywood deals, Mafia meetings, and FBI wiretaps. I could put the film in right now and watch it again--and I've seen it a half-dozen times.
The first time I saw it was one week after ABC aired a documentary about JFK and I was stunned that the doc backed up EVERYTHING in this movie. Not a lot of artistic license was played with the facts. None was needed.
In the mid-90s, some prelimenary announcements were made that Martin Scorsese was going to shoot a film version of Nick Tosches' great book about Dean Martin, DINO: LIVING HIGH IN THE DIRTY BUSINESS OF DREAMS. It was also announced that Tom Hanks would play Dino. A strange bit of casting but Hanks actually played Dean on a "Saturday Night Live" sketch and made it work (I thought so anyway). I'd also read that Hanks wanted to play the part so badly that he actually hosted a Christmas party completely in character as Dean. Dream casting notices appeared in the press that John Travolta would play Frank and Jim Carrey would be Jerry Lewis (Carrey's take on Jerry Lewis on "On Living Color" are classic).
And then nothing.
With all of those big names involved, the movie would cost more than TITANIC. As the DINO project fell apart, HBO shot and aired THE RAT PACK.
It's too bad. DINO sounded like an incredible movie.
Oh, well, at least we got something. And THE RAT PACK is a good movie.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 45
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