Pocketful of Miracles
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''Pocketful of Miracles'' is a 1961 American comedy film starring Glenn Ford and
Bette Davis Ruth Elizabeth "Bette" Davis (; April 5, 1908 – October 6, 1989) was an American actress of film, television, and theater. Regarded as one of the greatest actresses in Hollywood history, she was noted for her willingness to play unsympatheti ...
, produced and directed by
Frank Capra Frank Russell Capra (born Francesco Rosario Capra; May 18, 1897 – September 3, 1991) was an Italian-American film director, producer, and screenwriter who was the creative force behind Frank Capra filmography#Films that won Academy Award ...
, filmed in
Panavision Panavision Inc. is an American motion picture equipment company (law), company founded in 1954 specializing in cameras and photographic lens, lenses, based in Woodland Hills, Los Angeles, Woodland Hills, California. Formed by Robert Gottschalk a ...
. The screenplay by Hal Kanter and Harry Tugend was based on Robert Riskin's screenplay for the 1933 film '' Lady for a Day'', which was in turn adapted from the 1929 Damon Runyon short story "Madame La Gimp". That original 1933 film was also directed by Capra—one of two films that he originally directed and later remade, the other being '' Broadway Bill'' (1934) and its remake '' Riding High'' (1950). The film was the final project for both Capra and Thomas Mitchell. It marked Ann-Margret's film debut.
Peter Falk Peter Michael Falk (September 16, 1927 – June 23, 2011) was an American film and television actor. He is best known for his role as Columbo (character), Lieutenant Columbo on the NBC/American Broadcasting Company, ABC series ''Columbo'' (196 ...
was nominated for an
Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor The Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor is an award presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS). It has been awarded since the 9th Academy Awards to an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance in ...
.


Plot

"Dave the Dude", a very successful New York City gangster, has one superstition: he believes that the apples he buys from alcoholic street peddler Apple Annie bring him luck. Annie assures the Dude that his latest purchase is especially lucky. He then meets Elizabeth "Queenie" Martin, the daughter of a friend and speakeasy owner recently murdered for owing a lot of money to the wrong people. Queenie offers to pay him $5 a week from her cashier's salary toward the $20,000 owed him. Instead, trusting Annie's claim, he decides to make Queenie a nightclub star. To the astonishment of his right-hand man, "Joy Boy", he succeeds, and Queenie is able to pay off all her father's creditors after two years, just as
Prohibition Prohibition is the act or practice of forbidding something by law; more particularly the term refers to the banning of the manufacture, storage (whether in barrels or in bottles), transportation, sale, possession, and consumption of alcoholic b ...
ends. Dave has an important meeting with a very powerful underworld boss from Chicago, Steve Darcey, aka "Mr. Big". Darcey is debating whether to allow Dave to control the New York territory in exchange for $50,000 "as a token of good faith." Dave counters by demanding $100,000 "as a token of ''your'' good faith." Meanwhile, Annie has an illegitimate daughter named Louise, whom she sent to Europe as a baby. In her letters to Louise, she masquerades as wealthy socialite Mrs. E. Worthington Manville, sending Louise money she gets from the Dude and various "godparents" (her fellow beggars and panhandlers). Louise, now grown up, is bringing her Spanish fiancé Carlos and his father, Count Alfonso Romero, to meet her. Annie has been pretending she resides in a luxurious hotel (writing her letters on stolen hotel stationery) and has Louise's letters mailed there intercepted for her by an employee. However, the employee is fired when this is found out. Dave's girlfriend Queenie insists he help Annie continue her charade. Dave reluctantly goes along, worried that his luck would run out otherwise. Queenie has the bedraggled Annie made up to look like a sophisticated socialite, while Dave borrows an out-of-town friend's luxurious penthouse suite, complete with Hudgins the butler, and arranges for cultured pool hustler "Judge" Henry G. Blake to pose as Annie's husband. When Dave keeps postponing finalizing the deal with Mr. Big to help Annie, Joy Boy becomes increasingly exasperated and frightened. Dave manages to engineer a lavish reception, with New York's mayor and governor as guests, the night before Louise and her impressed future husband and father-in-law sail back to Europe, none the wiser about her mother's real identity. Mr. Big agrees to the Dude's terms, but the Dude decides to marry Queenie and settle down.


Cast


Production

Frank Capra had directed '' Lady for a Day'' in 1933, and for years, he had wanted to film a remake, but executives at
Columbia Pictures Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc., Trade name, doing business as Columbia Pictures, is an American film Production company, production and Film distributor, distribution company that is the flagship unit of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group ...
, which owned the screen rights, felt the original story was too old-fashioned. In the mid-1950s, when Hal Wallis offered to buy it as a
Paramount Pictures Paramount Pictures Corporation, commonly known as Paramount Pictures or simply Paramount, is an American film production company, production and Distribution (marketing), distribution company and the flagship namesake subsidiary of Paramount ...
vehicle for
Shirley Booth Shirley Booth (born Marjory Ford; August 30, 1898October 16, 1992) was an American actress. One of 24 performers to achieve the Triple Crown of Acting, Booth was the recipient of an Academy Award, two Primetime Emmy Awards and three Tony Awards. ...
, Columbia head
Harry Cohn Harry Cohn (July 23, 1891 – February 27, 1958) was a co-founder, president, and production director of Columbia Pictures, Columbia Pictures Corporation. Life and career Cohn was born to a working-class Jewish family in New York City. His fath ...
decided to offer it to Capra instead, hoping he could lure Booth to his studio. Unable to persuade either Abe Burrows or
Garson Kanin Garson Kanin (November 24, 1912 – March 13, 1999) was an American writer and director of plays and films. Early life Garson Kanin was born in Rochester, New York; his Jewish family later relocated to Detroit then to New York City. He at ...
to update the plot, Capra began working on the screenplay himself. His modern version, which involved Korean War orphans and an apple farm in Oregon, was filled with
Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...
rhetoric and retitled ''Ride the Pink Cloud''. Cohn insisted Capra find a collaborator, but he thought the draft submitted by Harry Tugend was no better, and he dropped the project. In 1960, Capra bought the screen rights from Columbia for $225,000, and the director made a deal with United Artists, where it was decided to film the story as a period piece set in the 1930s. Capra originally cast
Frank Sinatra Francis Albert Sinatra (; December 12, 1915 – May 14, 1998) was an American singer and actor. Honorific nicknames in popular music, Nicknamed the "Chairman of the Board" and "Ol' Blue Eyes", he is regarded as one of the Time 100: The Most I ...
as Dave the Dude, but the actor walked out due to disagreements about the script.
Kirk Douglas Kirk Douglas (born Issur Danielovitch; December 9, 1916 – February 5, 2020) was an American actor and filmmaker. After an impoverished childhood, he made his film debut in '' The Strange Love of Martha Ivers'' (1946) with Barbara Stanwyck. ...
,
Dean Martin Dean Martin (born Dino Paul Crocetti; June 7, 1917 – December 25, 1995) was an American singer, actor, and comedian. Nicknamed the "Honorific nicknames in popular music, King of Cool", he is regarded as one of the most popular entertainers of ...
and
Jackie Gleason Herbert John Gleason (born Herbert Walton Gleason Jr.; February 26, 1916June 24, 1987), known as Jackie Gleason, was an American comedian, actor, writer, and composer also known as "The Great One". He developed a style and characters from growin ...
rejected the role. Then Glenn Ford approached Capra with an offer to help finance the film through his production company if he were cast as the lead. The director felt Ford was wrong for the part, but out of desperation, he agreed to the arrangement, which called for each of them to receive 37½ percent of the film's profits. Ford was paid $350,000 upfront, but Capra received only $200,000. Because the film never earned back its cost, he lost an additional $50,000 in deferred salary. Budgeted at $2.9 million, the film began principal photography on April 20, 1961. Cast as Apple Annie was
Bette Davis Ruth Elizabeth "Bette" Davis (; April 5, 1908 – October 6, 1989) was an American actress of film, television, and theater. Regarded as one of the greatest actresses in Hollywood history, she was noted for her willingness to play unsympatheti ...
, who accepted the role after
Shirley Booth Shirley Booth (born Marjory Ford; August 30, 1898October 16, 1992) was an American actress. One of 24 performers to achieve the Triple Crown of Acting, Booth was the recipient of an Academy Award, two Primetime Emmy Awards and three Tony Awards. ...
,
Helen Hayes Helen Hayes MacArthur (; October 10, 1900 – March 17, 1993) was an American actress. Often referred to as the "First Lady of American Theatre", she was the second person and first woman to win EGOT, the EGOT (an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar, and ...
,
Katharine Hepburn Katharine Houghton Hepburn (May 12, 1907 – June 29, 2003) was an American actress whose Katharine Hepburn on screen and stage, career as a Golden Age of Hollywood, Hollywood leading lady spanned six decades. She was known for her headstrong ...
, and Jean Arthur declined it. Davis was undergoing financial difficulties, and the need for the $100,000 paycheck overshadowed her concern about making her Hollywood comeback (her last American film had been '' Storm Center'' in 1956) in the role of an elderly woman. From the beginning, she clashed with co-star Glenn Ford, who had demanded Hope Lange, his girlfriend at the time, be given the dressing room adjacent to his, which Davis had already been assigned. Davis graciously insisted any dressing room she was given would be adequate, noting "Dressing rooms have never been responsible for the success of a film." Despite her effort to avoid an unpleasant situation, Davis was given the room Lange had wanted, and from then on Ford began treating her like a supporting player. In an interview, he suggested he was so grateful to Davis for the support she had given him during the filming of '' A Stolen Life'' in 1946, he had insisted she be cast as Apple Annie in order to revive her sagging career, a condescending remark Davis never forgot or forgave. Because of Ford's involvement with the financing of the film, Capra refused to intervene in any of the disagreements between the two stars, but he suffered blinding and frequently incapacitating headaches as a result of the stress. Ann-Margret was paid $1,500 per week. Filming was completed in late June 1961, and Capra painfully struggled to get through the post-production period. Upon its completion, he professed to prefer the remake to the original, although most critics, and in later years film historians and movie buffs, disagreed with his assessment.


Reception

''Motion Picture Herald'' covered the preview and gave the film good marks, with the review headline "Pocketful of Dollars" predicting an excellent box office performance. ''Boxoffice'' confirmed that the film "ranked in the top hit class by exhibitors in the 20 key cities across the nation." The critic for ''The Hollywood Reporter'' also looked upon the film favorably, calling it "a Christmas sockful of joy, funny, sentimental, romantic ndfrankly capricious." Other reviewers were more guarded. In ''The New York Times'', A.H. Weiler noted: "Mr. Capra and his energetic troupe manage to get a fair share of laughs from Mr. Runyon's oddball guys and dolls, but their lampoon is dated and sometimes uneven and listless...Repetition and a world faced by grimmer problems seem to have been excessively tough competition for this plot." ''Variety'' thought the plot "alternates uneasily between wit and sentiment" and added "The picture seems too long, considering that there's never any doubt as to the outcome, and it's also too lethargic, but there are sporadic compensations of line and situation that reward the patience. Fortunately Capra has assembled some of Hollywood's outstanding character players for the chore...The best lines in the picture go to Peter Falk... hojust about walks off with the film when he's on." Veteran publisher Pete Harrison classed the film as only "fair," citing the Bette Davis approach to the May Robson portrayal: "The old Robson touch of wistful poignancy to the role is missing. Miss Davis' sharp, clipped, almost cold delivery gives you the feeling that any minute she'll be calling out to 'Petah.' She fails to beget your sympathy. For all the individual brilliance shown by he supporting players this doesn't quite reach its big picture objective. To be sure, it doesn't fail by much." Least impressed was Elaine Rothschild of ''Films in Review'': "This unbelievable and unfunny comedy proves only that director Frank Capra has learned nothing and forgotten nothing in the 28 years that intervened between the two pictures. ''Pocketful of Miracles'' is not merely out of whole cloth, but out of date, and watching it is a painful experience." ''Filmink'' argued Ann Margret "is sweet in a small but important part, one of the best things about the movie; she certainly made more of an impact than the bloke who plays her fiancee, another 'discovery' Peter Mann." Exhibitors protested Bette Davis's star billing as they worried it would hurt the box office, and the receipts did fall short of expectations.


Awards and nominations


Home media

MGM Home Entertainment MGM Home Entertainment LLC (also known as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Home Entertainment, d/b/a MGM Home Entertainment and formerly known as MGM Home Video, MGM/CBS Home Video and MGM/UA Home Video) is the home video distribution arm of the American med ...
released the film on VHS in 1997 followed by the Region 1 DVD on September 18, 2001. It is in non- anamorphic widescreen format with audio tracks in English and Spanish and subtitles in Spanish and French. It received a US Region A Blu-ray release on November 18, 2014 from
Kino Lorber Kino Lorber is an international film distribution company based in New York City. Founded in 1977, it was originally known as Kino International until it was acquired by and merged into Lorber HT Digital in 2009. It specializes in art film, art ho ...
.


Remakes

The film was remade in Persian as ''Gedayan Tehran'' (1967), Turkish as ''Elmacı Kadın'' (1971). ''Pocketful of Miracles'' is the basis for the 1989 Hong Kong film '' Miracles'' starring Jackie Chan and
Anita Mui Anita Mui Yim-fong (; 10 October 1963 – 30 December 2003) was a Hong Kong singer and actress who made major contributions to the Cantopop music scene and received numerous awards and honours. She remained an idol throughout her career, and i ...
, which later was remade as the 2008 Hindi-language Indian film '' Singh Is Kinng'', starring
Akshay Kumar Akshay Hari Om Bhatia (born Rajiv Hari Om Bhatia; 9 September 1967), known professionally as Akshay Kumar (), is an Indian actor and film producer working in Hindi cinema. Referred to in the media as "Khiladi Kumar", through his career span ...
and Katrina Kaif.


See also

* List of American films of 1961 * List of films featuring the deaf and hard of hearing


References


External links

* * *
Text of "Madame_La_Gimp"
by Damon Runyon. {{DEFAULTSORT:Pocketful Of Miracles 1961 films 1961 comedy films 1960s American films 1960s Christmas comedy films 1960s English-language films American Christmas comedy films Films based on short fiction Films directed by Frank Capra Films featuring a Best Musical or Comedy Actor Golden Globe winning performance Films scored by Walter Scharf Films set in the 1930s Films set in New York City Remakes of American films United Artists films Films based on works by Damon Runyon Films based on adaptations English-language Christmas comedy films