An Affair to Remember – 1957 McCarey

It has a lofty reputation as one of the great classic romances – it’s a fine film, and in the archives, but artistically it is dwarfed by comparison if you look at what say Douglas Sirk was doing in the melodrama genre during this stretch
They are much more prevalent in contemporary cinema of course- but there were remakes and sequels even back in the day—for McCarey this is remaking his 1939 film Love Affair—and that’s after doing a sequel for Going My Way
This is more trivia than anything but this film had quite a renaissance in the 1990’s when it became almost a character in the 1993 film Sleepless in Seattle
Shot in cinemascope for some reason—McCarey doesn’t use the canvas at all
I think it is an achievement for Cary Grant—he has to overcome an underwritten character and he’s very good here.
Vic Damone crooning over the opening titles—Mr. Damone- you are no Sinatra, sir- sorry
The original Love Affair is 88 mins and this one is almost 2 hours and you feel it here
Populist and broad humor- it’s a McCarey film so he plugs in a cute five year old for a sketch, throws in a goofy kids choir- he wields the sentiment like a weapon
The empire state building – there is actually a great shot at 70 minutes with it reflecting on the glass with Deborah Kerr in the frame

A great shot of the two of them separated by a divide – this isn’t exactly Antonioni using objects and space to tell a story in L’Eclisse —but still a nice shot