My Romance with Movies: From the 1950s: An Affair to Remember

1957 Romantic Drama

From 20th Century Fox

Directed by Leo McCarey

Starring

Cary Grant

Deborah Kerr

Richard Denning

Cathleen Nesbitt

Neva Patterson

Director McCarey's 1939 romantic escapade, Love Affair, with Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer, was refreshed, updated and released as this film which proved even more popular than the original. Indeed, it seems to be a movie to remember due to its cult-like standing. Some watch it at regular intervals and are able to munch popcorn and exchange kisses while they gleefully recite the sentimental lines from the final scenes.

Like a lot of others, I've had a fondness for this film for many years. For me the chief reason for that is not the story but rather its two stars. While Cary Grant moved through a variety of genres in his career, I preferred him in romantic comedies or romantic dramas over everything else. And in that vein, it's pretty difficult for him to top himself in another film in this genre.

What I always appreciated over anything else was his elegance. Nobody else quite looked or acted like him on screen although many gave him a good run. He was always such a gentleman and in this regard he was paired with an actress who was, on screen, always quite the lady. Their pairing is sheer perfection. When they talk about screen chemistry, they must have had them in mind. We'll get back to this before we close.

As if you didn't know, it is the story of an Italian playboy who partakes in a shipboard romance with a nightclub singer. While neither is married, both are involved with others who anticipate a betrothal in the future... in his case, the very near future.

Both realize from the start that they are interested in one another and she particularly wants to avoid any serious entanglement or publicity especially since both are people easily recognized. Some comedy sneaks into the proceedings as they try to avoid the stares and gossip of their fellow passengers.

When the ship docks at Villefranche-sur-Mer on the Mediterranean coast, the pair visits his beloved grandmother (Nesbitt) at her luxurious hilltop home. Other than the finale, this is my favorite part. This is where they learn more about one another and where the love of grandmother and grandson is so touching and where Kerr and the old lady bond. The view of the sea below is stunning as is her courtyard. The inside, while also quite lovely, was filmed on a California soundstage.

While they are visiting, Kerr sees the grandmother's shawl which she admires and says so. The grandmother promises that one day it will be hers.

By the time they reach New York the couple is in love. They agree to go on with their lives for six months without contact, mainly to take the time to shed their current partners and for him to secure regular employment. The plan is to meet atop the Empire State Building on July 1 at 5 p.m. When that time comes, he is in place as she arrives by cab. So excited is she that she runs from the cab and is hit by a car which ends up crippling her.

I have always, right here at this juncture, felt a enormous sadness and an empty feeling. I have always been able to put myself right into a story as though it might be happening to me. To think that this event could happen is bad enough but when one considers they don't communicate at all, the result is just so sad.

She decides to not tell him about her accident by simply not seeing him. Before the fateful ending, we learn about each of their relationships... hers with Richard Denning and his with Neva Patterson. (I was always struck by the fact that Grant was with Patterson because she was wealthy and he could continue cruising among the well-connected if he married her. This wasn't exactly fiction in the actor's life.)

Both tell their partners the truth of the voyage and neither partner seems particularly upset which always struck me as a bit peculiar although I suppose any other reaction would have caused the story, roaring to its climax, to veer off course.

We see Kerr singing in a nightclub (and I swear she never looked more stunning or different in any film than she does in this scene). Then after the accident she takes to teaching music to young children. For me, the couple of scenes with the children slow down the energy of the main story which I was hot to get back to. We also learn that Grant has taken up painting again and we observe him in conversation with his art dealer.

One evening both couples spot each other at the ballet. Grant is shocked to see her (still seated) since he didn't know if she were dead or alive. She was shocked to see him as well, mainly because of the secret she's keeping. Denning, in the next scene, tells her to tell Grant the truth but she refuses.

The day following the ballet, he shows up at her door, just as a neighbor is leaving. He was surprised to find her name (first initial and last name) and address in the phonebook. He finds her propped up on the sofa, glowing in red... that brilliant red hair, a red top and a red throw covering her legs.

After a little bantering, he says he's come to give her a gift. Her eyes fill with tears as she opens it to find his grandmother's shawl... as promised. Then he bids her farewell, telling her that he's sailing later that night. He stops at the door and turns and looks at her with the shawl draped around her.

You know, I painted you like that, he says, telling her that his art dealer gave the painting to a woman visiting his gallery. She liked the painting, much as I thought you would. He told the dealer to give her the painting because she didn't have any money and because she was.... she was... His face reveals that he has connected the dots.

He awkwardly looks for the painting. He opens her bedroom door (cue the music, that title theme, and the tears... his, hers, yours and mine) and there it is hanging on the wall. He stands at the bedroom door, thunderstruck, and closes his eyes. He knows the woman he's loved and lost and found again cannot walk.

Devotees of the film, and apparently you are legion, can handle the dialogue from now on. Personally, I am thinking of Kate Jackson and Michael Ontkean reciting the lines while they ate popcorn in Making Love.

Grant returns to her on the sofa and stands, looking down at her eyes filled with tears. Darling, she whimpers, don't look at me like that.

Why didn't you tell me? he pines. If it had to happen to one of us, why did it have to be you?

The camera moves in and caresses her face. Let's be on the same page here, when Deborah Kerr cried, it was a sad thing indeed, no matter the film. This one, however... with its what-might-have-been canvass and Kerr's sobbing voice... is utterly unforgettable. And she says as she kisses his cheek...

It was nobody's fault but my own... I was looking up. It was the nearest thing to heaven. You were there. Oh Darling, don't worry, Darling. She's crying harder as she dabs his tears with a tissue. If you can paint, I can walk. Anything can happen, don't you think?

Yes, Darling, yes. Yes. He dabs her eyes.

Cue that song again.

Now straighten up. Dry your eyes. Think of someone you've loved.

Even as a kid I was a sucker for a good love story. As I matured (and matured and matured), I always kept that with me. In my life I have been in love with two wonderful people, a woman and a man (at different times, mind you) and I've been blessed to have lived so long in love.

And I have always loved a good love story in books and at the movies or if a friend is sharing such a story with me. I don't care if a love story is sentimental. In fact, shouldn't it be? Isn't it more warm and fuzzy when it is? And if the sentiment moves me enough to cry, I'm a goner.

So yeah, along with westerns, musicals, film noir, adventure stuff, biographies, family stories, I like love stories... sentimental, well-made love stories. Most movies have some love story going on but I, of course, mean those where that's the main course rather than a side dish. The focus here is the love story.

Admittedly there is another view and to a degree, it is one that I understand. For example, in the film's most remembered scene, where is her wheelchair? If he hadn't come over, what was she expected to do? And what is that 6-month wait thing about? Aren't these adults? I'm not out to draw attention to the four or five of these that are there because they do not lessen the story that I am seeing at all or the acting. Maybe the movie folk should have cleared them up but they didn't and merrily we move along.

Grant and Kerr had worked together four years earlier in Dream Wife. There would also be The Grass Is Greener in 1960. They were pals when they began Affair and better pals when it was over. They were not unalike. They were both from Great Britain and had high-profile careers in the States. They largely didn't make bad choices in their pick of projects.

Both seemed strictly upper crust. It seemed as though they should have been addressed as Lord and Lady. Both led lives that were not exactly the same as their screen images and they always pulled it off. Both got out of the business while that image was still nicely intact.

He loved making her laugh and she loved laughing like she did with him. They maintained a certain level of privacy even with one another and neither was given to splashy tell-all interviews or thrilling encounters with fans.

He was said to have been pretty grumpy during filming. He was trying to quit his 46-year, three-pack-a-day cigarette habit and not in the best of spirits. Even hypnosis didn't quite do the trick.

Thankfully the warm and caring attitude McCarey brought to his films was evident in this one. However, his once-glorious directing career had cooled down some and he wanted another hit. Since Love Affair was so big in 1939, he thought he'd give it another try, with Grant egging him on. He wanted to have the part in the original because he was so impressed with the story and thought it would be a big hit, which it was. He even hung out on the 1939 set often to be with his friends. McCarey came close to seeing the project greenlit in 1952 with Fernando Lamas and Arlene Dahl in the lead roles. (Oh my...!) Finally came the mid-50s and filming would begin with Grant in the lead.

McCarey and co-writer Delmer Daves fashioned some amusing lines for the pair in the early scenes. McCarey had a rare trait for a director... he encouraged his lead actors to improvise their lines and these two apparently had a field day with it. I'd like to think that their early banter was somewhat improvised simply because it sounds like Grant, seems to express some of his personal opinions Not all of it got into the film but some did.

McCarey also shared writing credits on the title song, sung magnificently by Vic Damone over the opening credits. It's always been one of my favorite love songs. I love the words. I love the sentiment.

The music from the song is heard throughout the film, coming on like clockwork during the most emotional scenes. We hear the lyrics a couple of more times, once by Kerr (although she lip syncs to Marni Nixon's voice as happened a year earlier in The King and I).

When Oscar nominations were announced, An Affair to Remember would receive four... song, musical scoring, cinematography and costume design.

It was remade again in 1994 and again titled Love Affair, this time with the Beattys and Katharine Hepburn in her big screen swan song. It was less than successful. It was also heavily referenced a year earlier in 1993's Sleepless in Seattle.

The American Film Institute said it was the fifth best romance movie ever made.

Check out the stars chatting with the director with this trailer: