AN AFFAIR TO REMEMBER is a slick soap opera from 1957, with Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr. For many that’s enough reason to watch, since the elegant playing of these classy actors works to cover a slight script and the hokey shade to the storyline.

Cary and Deb meet on a trans-Atlantic liner. Despite Cary being married (unhappily) and Deb being promised to another (enter Resignation) they are thoroughly smitten. Tragedy intervenes. The Grace of the players has to duel with Leo McCarey’s stilted, old-fashioned direction.

The low point is a scene where a bunch of “cute” kids sing a song to Kerr. It seems almost ten minutes long and it’s a bad song, the kind of set-up that requires real professionalism to get through unscathedL she has it, they do not. The 115-minute story co-stars Richard Denning and Cathleen Nesbitt, and came in at #14 that year, grossing $11,000,000. Oscar nominations came courting for Cinematography, Score, Song (please…) and Costume Design.

Charge of the ‘charming’ tots. Where’s that porthole?

A remake of the directors 1939 hit Love Affair, it was done again in 1994 with that title, to less success. This version carries a reputation as a romantic classic and boasts legions of (mostly female) fans. It’s okay, but methinks the ardor stems from more mystique than magic. That’s a nitpick: fans of Grant and Kerr will catch this, even with that dumb song. And why not?