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Love Affair (1994)
Warren Beatty struck gold back in 1978 when he remade Here Comes Mr. Jordan as Heaven Can Wait. Wish the same could be said about his lavish big budget remake of Love Affair, which is only carried so far by the chemistry of Mr and Mrs. Beatty.
Mike Gambril (Warren Beatty) is a sportscaster who is engaged to an Oprah-like media queen (Kate Capshaw) who meets Terry McKay (Annette Bening), a singer engaged to a wealthy businessman (Pierce Brosnan) on a flight to Sidney, but the plane has to make an emergency landing and Mike and Terry are put on an ocean liner where they have a whirlwind romance. They decide that after the boat docks, they will give themselves three months to extricate themselves from their current romantic entanglements and meet at the top of the Empire State Building; however, tragedy intervenes and one of them doesn't make the fateful meeting.
This story first came to the screen in 1939 with Charles Boyer and Irene Dunne in the starring roles and was remade in 1957 as An Affair to Remember with Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr taking over the roles in what was probably the more famous version of the two, though Warren Beatty really missed the boat here as producer and co-screenwriter of this remake that went back to the original title and the 1939 screenplay by Leo McCarey and Donald Ogden Stewart. Unfortunately, Beatty and co-screenwriter Robert Towne seemed a little overly concerned with "updating" the story for the 1990's with a lot of unnecessary changes to the original story. The whole thing of Mike and Terry meeting on a plane that has to de-board and put everybody on a ship was just one of several reasons why this movie, with a running time under two hours, seemed more like four.
Warren Beatty and Annette Bening prove that the chemistry they had previously displayed in Bugsy and actually developed into a real life marriage, was no fluke, but it just wasn't enough to keep this film engaging. There's a whole lot of screentime consisting of planes and ocean liners and the Empire State Building being shot from different angles that did nothing but pad the running time. Producer Beatty also continues to be very protective of actor Beatty, making sure the actor is shot in dark lighting and with those filters they used to use on Doris Day, in an attempt to cover up the fact that Beatty is aging, something Beatty has been denial about for a long time.
It was curious that Beatty gave up the director's chair for this project that he produced and co-wrote. Glenn Gordon Caron, a director mostly known for his work in television, but did direct the excellent Clean and Sober, employs flawless production values, which don't disguise the fact that this movie moves at snail's pace. The late Garry Shandling makes the most of his role as Beatty's agent and there is a classy cameo by the legendary Katharine Hepburn, in her final feature film role, but what this film comes down to is the chemistry between the stars, which is there, but it's just not enough.
Warren Beatty struck gold back in 1978 when he remade Here Comes Mr. Jordan as Heaven Can Wait. Wish the same could be said about his lavish big budget remake of Love Affair, which is only carried so far by the chemistry of Mr and Mrs. Beatty.
Mike Gambril (Warren Beatty) is a sportscaster who is engaged to an Oprah-like media queen (Kate Capshaw) who meets Terry McKay (Annette Bening), a singer engaged to a wealthy businessman (Pierce Brosnan) on a flight to Sidney, but the plane has to make an emergency landing and Mike and Terry are put on an ocean liner where they have a whirlwind romance. They decide that after the boat docks, they will give themselves three months to extricate themselves from their current romantic entanglements and meet at the top of the Empire State Building; however, tragedy intervenes and one of them doesn't make the fateful meeting.
This story first came to the screen in 1939 with Charles Boyer and Irene Dunne in the starring roles and was remade in 1957 as An Affair to Remember with Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr taking over the roles in what was probably the more famous version of the two, though Warren Beatty really missed the boat here as producer and co-screenwriter of this remake that went back to the original title and the 1939 screenplay by Leo McCarey and Donald Ogden Stewart. Unfortunately, Beatty and co-screenwriter Robert Towne seemed a little overly concerned with "updating" the story for the 1990's with a lot of unnecessary changes to the original story. The whole thing of Mike and Terry meeting on a plane that has to de-board and put everybody on a ship was just one of several reasons why this movie, with a running time under two hours, seemed more like four.
Warren Beatty and Annette Bening prove that the chemistry they had previously displayed in Bugsy and actually developed into a real life marriage, was no fluke, but it just wasn't enough to keep this film engaging. There's a whole lot of screentime consisting of planes and ocean liners and the Empire State Building being shot from different angles that did nothing but pad the running time. Producer Beatty also continues to be very protective of actor Beatty, making sure the actor is shot in dark lighting and with those filters they used to use on Doris Day, in an attempt to cover up the fact that Beatty is aging, something Beatty has been denial about for a long time.
It was curious that Beatty gave up the director's chair for this project that he produced and co-wrote. Glenn Gordon Caron, a director mostly known for his work in television, but did direct the excellent Clean and Sober, employs flawless production values, which don't disguise the fact that this movie moves at snail's pace. The late Garry Shandling makes the most of his role as Beatty's agent and there is a classy cameo by the legendary Katharine Hepburn, in her final feature film role, but what this film comes down to is the chemistry between the stars, which is there, but it's just not enough.