Romantic Moment #10
An Affair to Remember (1957)
I love this movie so much! It is one of my favorite romantic films. I mean it has CARY GRANT in it, so already you know it is going to be wonderful.
Aw!
Now even if you haven’t seen it, this film may sound familiar to you. This is the film the Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks film that Sleepless in Seattle is based around. An Affair to Remember is the film that Meg Ryan’s character, Annie, and Rosie O’Donnell’s character, Becky, are crazy about. Even Tom Hanks character Sam’s sister Suzy, (played by Tom Hanks’ wife Rita Wilson) adores it. In fact if you haven’t seen either movie I recommend watching An Affair to Remember before Sleepless in Seattle. You just enjoy the movie on a deeper level that way.
An Affair to Remember is a remake of Love Affair starring Charles Boyer and Irene Dunne. As much as I like original films and Irene Dunne, I prefer An Affair to Remember because of Cary Grant. Like I said before, I’m a big fan.
An Affair to Remember is about two people who meet on a cruise and fall in love, although both’s affections are engaged elsewhere. Nickie Ferrante, (Cary Grant), is a playboy engaged to Lois Clark; while Terry McKay, (Deborah Kerr), is mistress to Kenneth Bradley. The two try to stay apart but spend dinners together, walks, Terry even meets Nick’s grandmother; and the two end up falling in love.
As both feel they are not good enough with the life styles they have been living, (both living off money provided from the people they are dating.) They agree to each live on their own and meet up in six months at the top of the Empire State Building. If the other doesn’t show up; the one waiting will know that they decided to go on with their life in the original direction planned.
In six months, Nickie is a painter and he eagerly rushes to the Empire State Building. Terry is a singer in a nightclub, and on her way to meet Nickie, she gets hit by a cab; paralyzed for the rest of her life. Nickie ends up waiting the whole night for her, but she never comes.
It’s so Sad!
Terry tells Nickie nothing about the accident, feeling that she is not worthwhile being paralyzed. She is too proud to go to him, and too scared. The two cross paths at a concert, and Nickie sees her with her old boyfriend, hurt and betrayed at what he thinks she did.
Will they be reunited or is this affair over for good?
Most Romantic Moment: Reunited Lovers
This romantic moment comes at the very end. It is the most romantic and I am so sorry I don’t have a video to show you, but I couldn’t find one.
It is Christmas day and Terry has decided to spend it home alone, when Nickie shows up, angry, bitter and hurt; but determined to give her the shawl that his grandmother left Terry when she died.
He tells her he painted a picture of her, and didn’t sell it. Instead a woman in a wheelchair wanted it, and didn’t have enough money so he had his dealer give it to her.
“Nickie Ferrante: You know, l painted you like that, with the shawl. l wish you could have seen it. Courbet said it was one of my best. l didn’t think l could ever part with it, but there was no reason to keep it any longer. l couldn’t take money for it because, well, you know…So Courbet told me a young woman came into the gallery and… she liked it. She saw in it what l’d hoped you’d see, so… l told Courbet to give it to her. Because he said she didn’t have any money, and not only that, she was…Anyway, l told him to give it to her…”
At first he is angry that she is so indifferent to him, and never even gets up to greet him just laying on the couch; but as he is talking he starts thinking about the woman in the wheelchair and Terry’s actions. Could they be the same person?
Nickie looks around, and then he sees it. THE PAINTING!
He runs to her and holds her in his arms.
This is the part everyone starts weeping at, bawling. Who can blame them? It is such a sweet moment, the two reunited.
“Terry McKay: Darling, don’t look at me like that.
Nickie Ferrante: Why didn’t you tell me? If it had to happen to one of us, why did it have to be you?
Terry McKay: It was nobody’s fault but my own. l was looking up. It was the nearest thing to heaven. You were there.
Nickie Ferrante: Oh, darling.
Terry McKay: Don’t worry, darling. If you can paint, l can walk. Anything can happen, don’t you think?
Nickie Ferrante: Yes, darling.
Terry McKay: Yes, darling.”
So romantic
So in Sleepless in Seattle, you get some great scenes of the women talking about this moment.
One of the best scenes is in the beginning when Becky and Annie are watching An Affair to Remember. I love this scene because it is the kind of conversations I have with my friends after I watch a great movie. I am always Annie in these scenarios.
“Annie Reed: Now those were the days when people knew how to be in love.
Becky: You’re a basket case.
Annie Reed: They knew it. Time, distance, nothing could separate them, because they knew it was right. It was real. It was…
Becky: A movie. That’s your problem. You don’t want to be in love. You want to be in love in a movie.
And then one of my favorite scenes is when Suzy shares the story of An Affair to Remember with her brother Sam and husband. The guys make fun of her, but I love this scene because when I bring up the story of An Affair to Remember I tell it in the exact same way Suzy does.
I love this scene because I can see myself having the reaction of Annie or Becky.
And in the end Annie and Sam get the romantic ending that Terry and Nickie never got.
To start Romance is in the Air from the beginning, go to Boom Box of Love: Say Anything (1989)
For the previous post, go to You’re Just Too Good Too Be True: 10 Things I Hate About You (1999)
For more on An Affair to Remember, go to People Have to Snatch at Happiness When They Can in This World. It is Always Easier to Lose Than to Find: O Pioneers!
For more on Cary Grant, go to On the 7th Day ‘Til Christmas: The Bishop’s Wife (1947)
For more on falling in love at a bad time, go to If I Never Knew You
For more remakes, go to A Tale So Strange It Must Be True: The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (2005)
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