Comment by Magic Marmalade:
"Winter must be cold for those with no warm memories..."
Yup, it's that one... heavily, not only influencing, but in many ways informing, if not actively helping create Sleepless In Seattle - The whole: Empire State Building scenario and so forth.
But it's a pretty odd movie, as much as it is a classic romance movie, in that the first half is pretty tedious, and dull, not only due to the limited expressive capabilities of Cary Grant (better at the comic stuff than the dramatic I feel), but also the rather empty "banter" and back and forth between him and Deborah Kerr, who has quite a stiff, school-matronly thing going on here, which mostly feels flat, and not quite as crackling as they were perhaps aiming for... Not good in a dialogue driven, two person focused movie; Especially when the lack of musical score for much of this makes it seem like you're on set, without all the production added, so it seems odd. In addition, many of these individual shots go on way too long, making it feel all the more awkward, like they should have cut to something else several seconds previous.
(There'a one scene in a small chapel where they are both praying silently to themselves, where I'm not entirely sure if she's reciting a prayer to herself, or the whole bloody bible!).
All of this is not a good mix, and as well as highlighting the dull clunky feel of it all, is apt to make you nod off.
And from this alone, I would have scored this a 5 out of 10 (5 being my baseline score of: "meh" - less than this represents a negative score in my book)
...Oh, and their respective "others", whom they are in relationships with, seem to be taking they news that they each love another in an altogether nonchalant, bordering on indifferent manner, which does lessen the dramatic stakes considerably .
But...
...Then, something remarkable happens, as the last half hour picks it up a couple of points for me, and makes the whole thing more worthy of it's "Classic" status... And better than this, the final five minutes (literally the last five minutes) are truly exceptional, even brilliant.
That final scene is probably one of the most inspired, and brilliant pieces of screenwriting in any romance movie, using the genius device of having him apologise to her for something she (apparently) has done to him, until she gets the point and the subtext is apparent to all of us in the audience. Masterfully done.
So this last scene is probably a 9 out of 10 (pushing towards a 10) and redeems the whole thing somewhat, and is worth watching for that alone.
One odd little thing that stuck in my head after the movie was over, was that it occurred to me that they meet on a boat when kerr's character finds his lost cigarette case....I'm pretty sure he doesn't smoke a single cigarette in the whole movie!
