An Affair to Remember, and Holiday
This was a week in which I got hardly anything done at work. After all, Monday was a holiday, and Wednesday I took the day off for the Red Sox game. Then, yesterday, our department (or is it our division? These terms are vague to me) had a picnic starting around noon, so I went into the office in the morning, and then went to the picnic for most of the afternoon, and came back and didn't get a whole lot done, unsurprisingly. So I got some stuff done today, but certainly I never hit a groove this week. Well, next week, I guess.
Affair is a straightforward love story which is filled with schmaltz, starting with the treacly music. It does have one tragic plot twist in the middle which is rather unexpected, and which does lead to a good - if quite melodramatic - encounter between the principles at the end. But the film is weighted down by its own pretensions. It manages to pull off (barely) the sentimental meeting with Nickie's grandmother, but jumps overboard showing us the principles' reactions to each others' lovers, and the amazingly contrived circumstances that keep them apart later in the film.
We're also supposed to believe - somehow - that Nickie is pretty much flat broke, and yet has been living the life of an internationally famous playboy for years. Apparently he's just incredibly good at sponging off the women he sees, or maybe he's supposed to be a gigolo (though the film really only suggests that his hormones are turned up a little too high).
This isn't one of Grant's better performances. Kerr (whom I've never seen before) does fine, although I personally didn't find her all that attractive (I actually found Lois far more so!). All of this conspired to make me wonder what exactly it was that made this "an affair to remember". The film seemed caught between trying to portray a high-profile romance, and a young-couple-making-something-of-themselves story. It was rather bizarre.
A much better - and earlier - Grant film is Holiday (1938). Grant plays young Johnny Case (young? Well, he's 30...), who meets Julia Seton (Doris Nolan), daughter of a wealthy father, and they fall in love. The story starts with Johnny coming to meet her family, which includes her crusty, judgmental father, her alcoholic brother Ned, and her free spirit sister Linda (Katharine Hepburn). Johnny tries to present himself as someone worthy of Julia's hand in marriage, but he has his own dreams, including making enough money to take some time off and enjoy life and find his purpose in it - while he's still young enough to appreciate it. Naturally, this doesn't play too well to the Setons - except to Linda, who has a similar outlook.
In contrast to his rather elegant (if wry) persona of the 50s and 60s, Grant's Johnny Case is a youthful, exuberant man who turns somersaults for fun every so often. His best friends are Nick and Susan Potter (Edward Everett Horton - playing a more serious role than he did in several Fred Astaire films - and Jean Dixon), a university couple. At the gala party where Johnny and Julia's engagement is announced, the Potters and Linda meet and become good friends, and Johnny feels himself caught in the middle - and he and Linda feel themselves drawn to each other.
Keeping in mind that I've only seen one other Katharine Hepburn film, this film makes me see why Hepburn was such a big star. She's beautiful in this film, and smart and clever and willful besides. Linda's been waiting her whole life to meet people like the Potters and Johnny, with whom she can really enjoy herself. Hepburn switches between airs of elegance, wistfulness, and exuberance as the scene demands. She and Grant each steal whichever scene they're in - except when they appear together, when neither upstages the other. It's all quite well-acted.
While the title "Holiday" doesn't make much sense (except perhaps that the film is bookended by two holiday trips, neither of which we actually see), this is a solid film well worth seeing.
|
|
|
|
