A Hole in the Head (1959) is a comedy film released by United Artists. It was directed by Frank Capra and featured Frank Sinatra, Edward G. Robinson, Eleanor Parker, Keenan Wynn, Carolyn Jones, Thelma Ritter, Dub Taylor, Ruby Dandridge and Joi Lansing.
The film introduced the song "High Hopes", a Sinatra standard used as a John F. Kennedy campaign song during the presidential election the following year. Wynn plays a wealthy former friend of Sinatra's character who expresses interest in his plan to build a Disneyland in Florida (the film predates Disney World)—until he notices that Sinatra seems too desperate as he cheers for a dog upon which he'd bet heavily. The movie ends with Tony, Eloise and Alley singing "High Hopes" on the beach.
The screenplay was adapted by playwright Arnold Schulman, whose father was the operator of a Miami, Florida hotel. The protagonist of A Hole in the Head is a Miami hotel operator of The Garden of Eden. The actual hotel used for the exterior shots was the Cardozo Hotel, located on Miami Beach's Ocean Drive. Shot over 40 days between 10 November 1958 and 9 January 1959, the film did not enjoy the smoothest of productions, especially during the location filming at Miami Beach. Sinatra's relations with the press were problematic, the media seizing on every anti-Sinatra rumor they could find.
Aided by William Daniels, Capra completed the film a full eighty days ahead of schedule, its final production cost of $1.89 million well under the allotted budget. The film opened on 17 June 1959. Although having some positive reviews, the film was only a modest box-office success, grossing $4 million in America.
Read more about A Hole In The Head: Plot, Broadway Play, Cast
Famous quotes containing the words the head, hole and/or head:
“Wild Bill was indulging in his favorite pastime of a friendly game of cards in the old No. 10 saloon. For the second time in his career, he was sitting with his back to an open door. Jack McCall walked in, shot him through the back of the head, and rushed from the place, only to be captured shortly afterward. Wild Bill’s dead hand held aces and eights, and from that time on this has been known in the West as “the dead man’s hand.””
—State of South Dakota, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“The cosmos is about the smallest hole that a man can hide his head in.”
—Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874–1936)
“Standing on the bare ground,—my head bathed by the blithe air, and uplifted into infinite space,—all mean egotism vanishes. I become a transparent eye-ball; I am nothing; I see all; the currents of the Universal Being circulate through me; I am part and particle of God.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)