The Man with the Golden Arm Film Analysis

The Man With the Golden Arm, made in 1955, stars Frank Sinatra and Eleanor Parker. Frank Sinatra plays Frankie Machine, a one-time heroin addict out of jail and on the search for a new life. Eleanor Parker plays Zosch, Frankie's melodramatic wife who is stuck in a wheelchair. She claims to be paralyzed from a drunk driving accident caused by Frankie some years before. The scene that will be analyzed in this paper deals with many issues vital to the movie. Frankie is trying to make a new life for himself, while Zosch wants him to deal cards again and make fast cash for her. She manipulates Frankie back into his old life by guilt-tripping him about her situation. She also verbally cuts him down, destroying his self confidence and masculinity. As the psychoanalysis of this scene will show, Zosch is a sexual female character who castrates Frankie and demands power in an aggressive, masculine way.

One can see, through the cuts that occur in this scene, Zosch is not a passive female. Three cuts occur during this scene at an odd but worthy moment. Frankie has returned to his drums after Zosch has verbally cut him down again. The technique of using cuts here shows the audience a visual cut of what Zosch is doing to Frankie's masculinity. The camera follows him, for the first time since the scene began, leaving her in the foreground alone. While he is drumming, the camera cuts to her. She yells that the drumming gives her a headache. The focus immediately returns to a very hurt Frankie. He says that he has to practice sometime. The camera cuts back to her as she tells him to take the drums down to his girlfriend and give her the headache. Immediately he walks towards Zosch, bringing the focus of the camera back to her. The camera usually is non-intrusive, following whoever is moving. However, as Frankie gets closer to Zosch, the camera gets closer as well. The tight frame allowed by the camera mirrors the tight situation Frankie and Zosch are in. She has control over him through her knowledge of the girlfriend. Likewise, she controls the camera for he brings the focus back to her. He leaves, taking the camera focus with him; but she brings up the girlfriend, bringing him and the camera, back to her.

The background also proves Zosch's aggressive control . Frankie and Zosch are poor and live in a very sparse apartment. The furniture is stacked along the side of the walls giving Zosch full reign over the space. The wallpaper is barred and dark, but only exists around the area of the bed. At the beginning of the scene, Frankie is surrounded by the bars of the bedroom. The bars around the bed signify the entrapment Frankie is in. Frankie is searching for his drumsticks, and as will be discussed later, his masculinity. Therefore, the bars show he is trapped sexually to his handicapped wife who verbally castrates his masculinity. The window is covered in dark curtains and blocked by Frankie's drum set. This arrangement makes it the only place in the apartment Zosch cannot wheel free; the one area of the apartment that belongs to Frankie. His slight area of masculinity is shown whenever Zosch is by the drum set, for she blends into the background. Since the drums are blocking the window, she cannot get to the window to open up the curtains without revealing the truth of her handicap. Therefore, even though a window usually denotes freedom, no one is free in this apartment. Whenever Zosch tells Frankie to take the drums to his girlfriend because it gives her a headache, she is gaining control of the apartment again.

Zosch is castrated psychoanalytically by being a woman, and physically by being assigned to a wheelchair. Because of this, she castrates Frankie by verbally tearing apart his masculinity and taking it for herself. Through verbally attacking Frankie's self-confidence and masculinity, Zosch takes the Law of the Father into her own hands. Law of the Father focuses on language and the manipulation of words. Psychoanalytic and American Literary Culture says "that through words alone emotional experiences 'can be examined, reviewed, reorganized and controlled" (Stone 315). Zosch twists Frankie's emotional experiences around manipulating them and controlling them through words.

Zosch uses more than words to gain control. Body language is intense in this scene. Zosch is visually lower than Frankie because she is in the wheelchair, but she sits up straight demanding every part of the screen she can. Frankie, though, is a small guy and slouches over, taking up less space. Rarely in this scene does Frankie stand up straight. When he does, Zosch immediately cuts him back down to size. Whenever Zosch must admit to standing and hiding the drumsticks above the cabinet, she starts to fiddle with the blanket on her legs. In this manner, Zosch is revealing the truth while visually covering up her lie.

Zosch shows the typical motherly personality through her focus on a dog at the beginning of the scene. The dog serves as a child that she cannot have. Since she is in the wheelchair, her sexuality has been taken away from her and she cannot have kids. Although her sexuality has been lessened, it is still present. She always has her hair down, a style that was usually connected with sex or the bed. Also, she wears silky blouses that draw attention to her chest.

The drumsticks are very important to this scene for they serve as a phallic symbol. In the beginning of the scene, Frankie is searching for his drumsticks, or rather, his masculinity. The drumsticks are found on top of a cabinet, too high for Zosch to reach in her wheelchair unless she stood up. By standing and defying her weak state, Zosch controls the castrated image. Also, she uses this strength to hide Frankie's drumsticks proving she has manipulative control over his masculinity. Frankie has the drumsticks in his hands throughout most of the scene. Whenever she starts verbally abusing him, he nervously handles the drumsticks, desperately trying to hang on to the manhood he has left. Whenever he leaves the apartment, he tosses the drumsticks aside, proving his masculinity is not endangered outside of her presence.

Just as Frankie uses the drumsticks to retain his masculinity, Zosch uses beer to control her aggressive side. Beer is not typically seen as a feminine drink, therefore Zosch's attachment to beer shows her aggressive control over her marriage. Zosch says she wants beer. Frankie immediately tells her that she cannot have beer because she cannot exercise. He is forceful at this point, using his masculinity to control her image. She tells him it is not her fault she cannot exercise, immediately throwing guilt into his face and gaining back control of the situation. At the beginning of the scene Zosch is giving the dog beer and, while Frankie is not looking, drinks some for herself. Later when the cuts occur, Zosch is nursing a beer, holding it tightly to her lips without drinking it. Just as he is drumming, searching for his masculinity, she cradles the beer, holding on to her aggressive control.

Laura Mulvey states that women are a castrated image and they must succumb to that knowledge and remain silent. Zosch, however, does not remain silent. Instead she constantly reminds her husband it is his fault she is the way she is. In this manner, Zosch executes a masculine way of dealing with castration. According to Mulvey, "Voyeurism has associations with sadism: pleasure lies in ascertaining guilt (immediately associated with castration), asserting control and subjecting the guilty person through punishment or forgiveness" (14). Zosch throws guilt at Frankie forcing him to change his ways and give in to her power. In this way, Zosch is performing as a masculine character would in response to a castrated female.

Although Zosch's character can be described in Mulvey's article, a better description was found in Film and Psychoanalysis. A small part is devoted to the "monstrous woman" who is an "active, terrifying fury, a powerfully abject figure, and a castrating monster" (Creed 86). Through psychoanalysis, one can see that Zosch is not a typical passive female. Instead, she is the masculine view of castration using the Law of the Father to enforce her sadistic ways. More than that, Zosch is the castrating monster, the aggressive character who verbally accosts Frankie's masculinity in order to gain control over the situation.
In conclusion, The Man With the Golden Arm has many aspects worthy of analytical study. Characterization is the most interesting. Frankie does not behave like a typical male, instead he seems to take on the female trait of passivity. Zosch, on the other hand, serves as the masculine figure castrating her spouse with verbal abuse. Through psychoanalysis, one can see that Zosch is an aggressive and controlling masculine presence.