An Affair to Remember DVD review

An Affair to Remember is a romance classic like few others. Not only has the film been remade and a remake itself of Leo McCarey’s earlier 1939 version, but it was also a helpful in the design of key plot points in the modern romance classic, Sleepless in Seattle. An Affair to Remember is a wonderful and delightful romance filled with comedy and melodrama, banter and tears. Capable actors such as Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr were both quite adept at delivery quick lines from screwball comedies and tears from their melodramas and had even starred in a film together prior to An Affair to Remember, so the combination of both in this simple masterpiece is no less delightful 50-years later. Nearly every element was carefully constructed to create a film of mass-appeal, and the appeal still continues from the Oscar nominated song to the closing credits.

Cary Grant is playboy Nickie Ferrante who has recently become engaged in order to keep up his lifestyle in An Affair to Remember, and on the ocean liner to join his new fiancé he meets Terry McKay (Deborah Kerr), a poor singer who is also attached to a man and on her way to join him. They meet and begin spending time together, although both knowing that there is no chance for a romantic relationship. The more time together they spend, the more they begin to fall in love, although refraining from acting on it until the last evening. They part ways, agreeing to meet in six months at the top of the Empire State Building, neither prepared for what might happen if one isn’t able to make it.

An Affair to Remember is an unabashedly sentimental film, and for this reason the Anniversary Edition is certain to inspire joy in many passionate fans of the film. The first disc of the two-disc set contains the film in all of its wonderful color glory, along with an optional commentary track with singer Marnie Nixon and film historian Joseph McBride. The second disc in the set has an incredible amount of featurettes as well as a Backstory episode about An Affair to Remember from AMC. The featurettes cover Deborah Kerr, Cary Grant and his rocky history with director Leo McCarey, and the producer Jerry Wald. The DVD also includes an insert with a few pages of backstory about the film and an envelope of lobby cards.