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An Affair to Remember

Screening on Film
Directed by Leo McCarey.
With Cary Grant, Deborah Kerr, Richard Denning.
US, 1957, 35mm, color, 115 min.

McCarey retools his understated classicism for 1950s widescreen Technicolor in this remake of Love Affair. This time the "man of the world and [the] woman of leisure" (as the promotional material for Love Affair put it) are played by Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr. Once again, bliss gives way to tragedy, but here, even more than in the original, McCarey stresses the power of redemption, a theme that emerged ever more strongly in his work from Ruggles of Red Gap through his 1940s films. Unquestionably a bit less restrained than Love Affair, this version nevertheless retains the power to move audiences. "Neither star ever showed quite this much delicacy before or after, and McCarey's elliptical way of framing key emotional moments meshes perfectly with their sublime performances." – Jonathan Rosenbaum

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