Beyond the Sea ( 2004 )

The life of crooner/actor Bobby Darin is presented as part fact, part fiction and much fantasy. It is framed around a biopic being filmed about and starring Darin as himself, with he being surrounded by many of his lifelong entourage from the Bronx. In that fantasy, the young actor portraying him as a child in the biopic emerges as his true younger self, questioning, knowing all, if his adult self wants the biopic to be all sugar and roses, as is the want of his manager, Steve Blauner, or if he wants to tell the truth. Regardless, what is presented of his life includes: his sickly childhood - where he was not expected to survive past his teens - with his vaudevillian mother, Polly Cassotto, his musical mentor, and his much older sister, Nina Cassotto, both who ultimately lived vicariously through his fame; his early singing career where the ultimate goal was not to rival but surpass the fame of Frank Sinatra; the meeting of who would become his wife, already famous actress Sandra Dee - his costar in his first movie role - he needing to win over her protective stage mother, Mary Douvan, to get to Sandra; their turbulent marriage due to the competing priorities of work and family, and their respective egos not allowing each to celebrate the other's success; his turn to political activism in the late 1960s during the changing times when his style of music was no longer in vogue; what affected his thoughts of running for political office himself; and how he tried to reinvent his singer self in the early 1970s.—Huggo