An Affair to Remember is a 1957 American romance film directed by Leo McCarey. It stars Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr. The film was made using CinemaScope technology and was released by 20th Century Fox. The American Film Institute lists it as one of the most romantic films ever made. It is a remake of McCarey’s 1939 film Love Affair, which featured Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer in the lead roles.

Plot

Nickie Ferrante, a famous socialite, meets Terry McKay on the transatlantic ocean liner SS Constitution while traveling from Europe to New York. Each is in a romantic relationship with someone else. After several meetings on the ship, they become friends. When Terry joins Nickie for a short visit to his grandmother, Janou, while the ship is near Villefranche-sur-Mer on the Mediterranean coast, Terry sees Nickie in a new way, and their feelings grow stronger. During the visit, Janou tells Terry that Nickie is a skilled painter but destroys most of his work because he believes it is not good enough. As the ship returns to New York, they agree to meet again in six months at the top of the Empire State Building if they have ended their relationships and started new careers.

On the day of their meeting, Terry is hit by a car while crossing the street and is seriously injured. She is quickly taken to the hospital. Meanwhile, Nickie waits for her at the Empire State Building’s observation deck but, after many hours, leaves at midnight, thinking she has chosen not to meet him.

After the accident, Terry, who can no longer walk, refuses to contact Nickie because of her disability. Instead, she becomes a music teacher. Nickie continues painting, and his work is shown in a gallery owned by Courbet. Six months later, Terry sees Nickie with his former fiancée at a ballet performance. Nickie does not notice Terry’s disability because she is seated, and they greet each other.

Nickie learns Terry’s address and visits her on Christmas Eve. He tries to ask her why she avoided him, but Terry avoids answering and stays on the couch. He gives her a shawl that Janou, who has since died, left for her. As he leaves, Nickie mentions a painting he was working on when they first met, which he recently gave to a woman who liked it but could not afford it. He almost says the woman was in a wheelchair but stops, suddenly realizing why Terry has not moved from the couch. He enters her bedroom and sees the painting hanging on the wall, understanding that Terry was the woman who could not walk. The film ends with the two embracing tightly as Terry says, “If you can paint, I can walk. Anything can happen, don’t you think?”

Cast

• Cary Grant played the role of Nickie Ferrante
• Deborah Kerr played the role of Terry McKay
• Richard Denning played the role of Kenneth Bradley
• Neva Patterson played the role of Lois Clark
• Cathleen Nesbitt played the role of Janou (Nickie's grandmother)
• Robert Q. Lewis played the role of himself (announcer)
• Charles Watts played the role of Ned Hathaway
• Fortunio Bonanova played the role of Courbet
• Marni Nixon provided the singing voice for Terry McKay

Production

The movie was a remake of McCarey's 1939 film Love Affair, starring Irene Dunne as Terry and Charles Boyer as the French playboy Michel Marnet. Plans to make a new version of Love Affair were first announced in 1952, with Fernando Lamas and Arlene Dahl involved in the project.

Cary Grant first worked with McCarey on the film The Awful Truth and did not like McCarey's improvisational strategy. However, after eventually coming to like it, he wished he had been in Love Affair and often visited the set during production. He enjoyed the film when it was released and later convinced McCarey to make a new version with Grant playing Boyer's role. McCarey once said, "Hollywood films all seem to be trying to find a trick way of saying 'I love you.' What are they trying to prove? Love is the oldest and noblest emotion."

An Affair to Remember was almost the same as the original movie scene by scene. McCarey used the same screenplay written by Delmer Daves and Donald Ogden Stewart. However, Stewart was not listed in the credits because he was blacklisted. Filming took place between February and April 1957.

Grant was reportedly grumpy during filming because hypnotherapy with his wife made him dislike smoking. He also had an operation during production to treat a lump on his forehead that came from a childhood injury.

The theme song "An Affair to Remember (Our Love Affair)," composed by Harry Warren and with lyrics by Leo McCarey and Harold Adamson, was sung by Vic Damone at the beginning of the film and by Marni Nixon (who provided the voice for Kerr) during the movie.

Songs

• "An Affair to Remember (Our Love Affair)" sung by Vic Damone
• "Continué" sung by Marni Nixon (who provided the voice for Kerr)
• "The Tiny Scout (He Knows You Inside Out)" sung by Marni Nixon (who provided the voice for Kerr)
• "Tomorrow Land" sung by Marni Nixon (who provided the voice for Kerr)
• "You Make It Easy to Be True"

• Music composed by Harry Warren
• Lyrics written by Harold Adamson and Leo McCarey

Other recordings of the song were available for sale at the same time as the film, including versions by Carmen Cavallaro (Decca Records), Pete King (Liberty), Angela Drake and Leroy Holmes (M-G-M), The Leaders (PIV), Luis Arcarez (RCA Victor), Machito (Tico), and Vi Vienne (VIP Records).

Novelization

Before the movie came out, Avon Books released a paperback version of the screenplay as a novel. The name Owen Aherne was a fake name used by American novelist R.V. Cassill.

Reception

In October 1958, Variety estimated the film had earned $7 million worldwide.

Bosley Crowther of The New York Times said the beginning of the film was enjoyable, with "plenty of humorous conversation that is handled clearly" by the main actors. However, he believed the story became problematic after the couple gets off the boat. He wrote: "The marriage agreement seems very childish for adults to make. The woman not telling her fiancé about her accident seems unreasonable. It is hard to believe the man does not learn about it somehow. The man’s slow understanding when he visits the woman is too slow to believe." Richard L. Coe of The Washington Post agreed, saying the film had "early amusing scenes that later become foolish in trying to make the audience emotional." Variety disagreed, calling the romance "never overly emotional" and "completely believable" in a positive review, calling it "a winning film" with "all the elements that should make it a great women’s picture." Harrison's Reports was also positive, saying it was "more charming and pleasant than the original" and "so powerful in the final scenes that it is hard to stop crying." John McCarten of The New Yorker was not impressed, writing that the actors were "acceptable, but the movie is overly emotional." A generally positive review in The Monthly Film Bulletin called the film "a rich example of Hollywood romance, following many familiar ideas from glossy magazine stories. Judging it on a higher level would usually seem unfair, but here the script does manage to go deeper. The relationship between Ferrante and Terry McKay is clearly developed, with an attractive, often touching humor." The Philadelphia Inquirer review compared it to the 1939 version: "18 years ago we cried and worried over the romantic feelings of Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer in 'Love Affair.' It seems much less important now when misunderstandings cause problems between Deborah Kerr and Cary Grant in 'An Affair to Remember,' Leo McCarey's long version of 'Love Affair.'"

The film holds a 65% "Fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 34 reviews. In 1998, Jonathan Rosenbaum of the Chicago Reader included the film in his unranked list of the best American films not on the AFI Top 100. It is one of the BFI’s "50 great Christmas films currently streaming."

Legacy

• Nora Ephron’s 1993 film Sleepless in Seattle, starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan, was inspired in part by An Affair to Remember, especially the ending. The film includes references, movie clips, and the theme song from An Affair to Remember.
• A 1994 remake, which changed back to the original title Love Affair, starred Warren Beatty (who also wrote and produced the film) and his wife, Annette Bening. The film included Katharine Hepburn in her final role, where she played the male lead’s aunt. This character replaced the grandmother from the original film.
• İlk Aşk, a 1960 Turkish film, was based on An Affair to Remember.
• Bheegi Raat, a 1965 Bollywood film starring Ashok Kumar and Meena Kumari, was based on An Affair to Remember.
• Yağmur, a 1971 Turkish film starring Hülya Koçyiğit and Ediz Hun, was based on An Affair to Remember.
• Mann, a 1999 Bollywood film starring Aamir Khan and Manisha Koirala, closely followed An Affair to Remember scene by scene.
• The 1999 Indian Telugu-language film Ravoyi Chandamama was based on An Affair to Remember.
• In 2009, the HBO film Grey Gardens used an aerial shot of The Pierre hotel from An Affair to Remember.
• The ending of the 1980 Bollywood film Ek Baar Kaho was inspired by the ending of An Affair to Remember.
• A sound clip from An Affair to Remember was used in the 2011 song “Fading” from Basement’s album I Wish I Could Stay Here.
• In a Season 3 episode of Gossip Girl, characters Chuck and Blair rekindle their relationship and plan to meet on top of the Empire State Building at 7:01 p.m., just as in An Affair to Remember.
• In the TV series 30 Rock, Tracy Jordan claims to have appeared in a remake of An Affair to Remember called A Blaffair to Rememblack.
• In an episode of Family Guy, a short scene shows how An Affair to Remember might have played out in the age of cell phones. After being hit, Terry tells Nickie she is paralyzed, then ends the call and throws the phone off the observation deck.
• In the Futurama episode “Meanwhile,” after proposing to Leela, Fry invites her to meet him atop the Vampire State Building at 6:30 p.m. if she agrees to marry him. If she doesn’t arrive, he will think she said no.