LISTS… My Three Fave Films with Second Chance Love

#1980s #2000s #AllPosts

 

Three women are taking a chance on love again…

 

The fourth of my Wandering Through the Shelves for 2022 posts list three of my favourites on this topic.

 

Kiss Me Goodbye (1982)

Shirley Valentine (1989)

 

This is the next of my 2022 posts for this weekly entertainment-themed challenge from Wandering Through the Shelves.  For my second of two posts for February, the challenge was to pick three of my favourite movies for the subject, Romance Tropes Edition: Second Chance Love. Please note I will be adding links to the pages for this post as I get them…

As always this 2022 blogging challenge is found HERE… and this page also includes other challenges for this year, if you are now keen to join this fun collaboration.

…. welcome to Thursday Movie Picks a weekly series where you share your movie picks each Thursday. The rules are simple: based on the theme of the week pick three to five movies and tell us why you picked them.

All my weekly contributions for 2022 are found HERE… and my and others’ contributions for this particular topic are HERE (link to be added as I get it).  

 

Kiss me Goodbye (1982)…

Kiss Me Goodbye trailer, British Secret Agent 007

In Kiss Me Goodbye (1982), Sally Field is Kay, a young widow who moves back into the home she lived in with her first husband – a Broadway director and choreographer – Jolly (James Caan). She’s now engaged to be married to the intelligent, genial and devoted Egyptologist Rupert (Jeff Bridges), who she met two years ago.

As she and her mother (Claire Trevor) get the house ready for Kay to live in again after her marriage, Kay remembers her first husband, the charming and outgoing Jolly. She recalls his fatal accident in vividly told flashbacks. Jolly fell down the stairs at a party as the couple celebrated his Broadway success at the Tony Awards.

Kay then believes that she hears someone tap dancing, but it’s just the wind blowing on a Jolly-inspired puppet. Soon after this incident, she sees Jolly’s ghost and he tells her that has been haunting their marital home. It seems that only Kay can see, hear and speak to Jolly, so her mother and friends become concerned about her health, as from their POV she’s talking to herself. 

At first, Kay tries to cover up that Jolly’s back in her life even when she’s caught talking to him. But she later confesses about his ghostly return to Rupert, after Jolly appears as she and Rupert are in bed together and about to make love… Over time, Kay appears to fall in love with her husband again and she feels she can’t choose between these two very different men. And it’s a wee bit complicated as both men love her too, and she’s getting married to Rupert in a week’s time…

Sally Field was nominated for a Golden Globe for her performance in this screenplay written by Charlie Peters. Peters adapted it from the Brazilian film, Dana Flor and her Two Husbands (1976) and this screenwriter also wrote the Brazilian set film, Blame it on Rio (1984). The plot of Kiss Me, Goodbye with a Sally Field character choosing between two wildly different characters reminded me of her role in Surrender (1987).

As Kay, Field has delightful on-screen romantic chemistry and poignant, comic and romantic scenes with both actors. You can feel her love, attraction and exasperation with both men as the story continues. In this film, Field gives her all and her inner torment is expressed in her flustered and anguished expressions. This is as Kay tries to make sense of her love life, be it the reasons for her former husband’s ghostly presence or her current fiance’s often non-sensical reactions to her haunting story.

Bridges was convincing in this more genuine character and he seemed like a more affable and nicer character than her husband. Jolly hopes to rekindle his relationship with his wife but his character came over as quite arrogant, presumptive and smug in contrast to the more sensitive and likeable Rupert. Bridges showed his talents in both dramatic and comic scenes where his character is challenged by his fiance’s former lover’s presence. He gave an empathetic performance despite his often bizarre methods to keep his fiance such as exorcism and responding to this ghostly presence of this seemingly perfect and much-loved husband.

Jolly appeared to revel in his situation at first and it appeared Caan was having fun in this role.  I learned Cann disliked making this film and chose not to make a film for five years after this film wrapped. There are some fabulous orchestrated scenes and many well-choreographed comic situations with others and Jolly but seen from Kay’s point of view and where only Kay sees and interacts with the then present James Caan. However despite finding both men attractive and loveable in their own particular ways, which one will Kay kiss goodbye? 

 

Shirley Valentine (1989)…

SHIRLEY VALENTINE (1989) movie trailer – Hippie Fish Mykonos, MykonosVibes

Another film with second chance love themes is the British film, Shirley Valentine (1987). This is another romantic comedy film and was based on a one-person play. In this film, bored and married housewife, Shirley Bradshaw (Pauline Collins) has second chance love in all its forms, be it her beginning to love life and herself once more and also her love stories with two men.

Shirley Bradshaw – nee Valentine – is a middle-aged Liverpudlian woman who is taken for granted by her family. Her humdrum life is seen in some fabulous sketches in the opening credits. She talks to the fourth wall (literally) in this movie. She often talks to the kitchen wall and the fourth wall – her true “friends” – about her current life.

She and her boorish husband Joe (Bernard Hill) had a fun, playful and loving relationship after they first got married. But now they have two grown-up children who have left home, and her life with her husband is routine and stale. Shirley has a dream of travelling – and her husband doesn’t – and drinking wine, sitting at a table by the sea and watching the sun go down.

Shirley’s glamorous friend, Jane (Alison Steadman) wins a trip to Greece for two in a magazine competition. She asks Shirley to come with her, and after a wee bit of encouragement, Shirley takes her friend up on her offer. Jane deserts Shirley and leaves with a man she meets on the flight after the plane lands in Mykonos.

Alone, Shirley begins to enjoy herself by immersing herself in Greek life and culture – unlike the other apparently more ignorant Brits, who she despairs of – and she even finds time for a friendship with Costas (Tom Conti). Costas is a charming Greek tavern owner who makes her dream come true. After her romance ends, Jane returns and expects her friend to spend time with her. But she is now stunned by Shirley who now tells her she has her own plans and then leaves with Costas who takes her out in his boat to show her more of Greece. 

Despite her initial requests to keep things platonic, her friendship with Costas unexpectedly develops into a passionate holiday fling. In Greece, Shirley feels more in love with life and herself and it’s seen that her confidence has increased. She also speaks up for herself and puts herself first without feeling guilty. After getting attention from another man, Costas, Shirley feels attractive, desirable and loveable and her character arc transforms her both physically and emotionally.

After spending more time in Greece, Shirley doesn’t want to return to her old life. She leaves Jane alone at the Greek airport as their holiday ends. Shirley then returns to the tavern… Meanwhile, her husband is waiting for her at the British airport. After she doesn’t arrive, Joe’s frantic and he calls Shirley and tries to convince her to come home. Then after some encouragement from their son, Joe catches a plane to Mykonos…

This is a lovely dramatic story and has a credible and poignantly comic performance from Collins. She initially performed this title role in London’s West End and later on Broadway. The men in Shirley’s life are also convincingly portrayed and both these characters were fleshed out in the play and are expertly created with some great dialogue. These men were performed by British character actors and the Glaswegian Conti adds a convincing Greek accent to Costas.

The script and scenes with flashbacks and other characters’ dialogue reflect the younger Shirley’s personality, hopes and dreams. They also show the contrast between the happier more fun and often sexy times during the Bradshaws’ marriage in the early days and now marriage where things have become repetitive and dull. These scenes captured the younger Shirley and her zest for life and living, and she recaptures the girl that she used to be in her experiences with and without Costas in Greece.  

As a Willy Russell play – he also wrote Educating Rita (1983) – it is a rich comic script for this cast, and Collins won Oscar, BAFTA and Golden Globe nominations for her performance. Like Sally Field in Kiss me Goodbye (1982), she played a similar character in a later film. In The Time Of Their Lives (2017), she starred as an unhappily married housewife who has an unexpected fling with a European gent). But this time with the more dulcet tones of Italian born, Franco Nero.

 

Atonement (2007)…

Atonement – Cecilia and Robbie Ending scene, Love on Screen Movies and Tv series

But my favourite romance, the second time around is in the film Atonement tells of love rekindled. Set in three different times in the upper-class Briony Tallis’ life, it starts in the summer of 1935. It tells about a burgeoning attraction between Briony’s older sister, Cecilia Tallis (Keira Knightley) and working-class Robbie Turner (James McAvoy).

After Cecilia breaks a vase next to a fountain, Robbie demands she collect the pieces from the bottom. Cecilia strips down to her underwear and as she watches this event, it is misunderstood by her young 13-year-old sister, Briony (Saoirse Ronan) – a budding author – who is watching from her bedroom window.

Robbie apologises for his behaviour to Cecilia in a letter, but after this, he writes a raunchy letter telling her about his romantic – and lustful – feelings for her. After spotting Briony, he asks her to deliver the letter to her sister. By mistake, he gives her the wrong letter and naturally its contents affect this young messenger after she reads it. She then gives the letter given to her sister. Robbie apologises to Cecilia in person after he realises about this mistake, and the pair make love in the library, and this is witnessed by Briony.

Later that night, after Briony and Cecilia’s young twin boy cousins run away. Everyone searches for the two boys, including Briony’s older brother’s friend, the rich – and somewhat sleazy – Paul (Benedict Cumberbatch). While looking for the boys, Briony witnesses her troubled and precocious cousin, Lola apparently being raped by a man in the shadows. Briony later accuses Robbie of this apparent rape and Robbie is falsely imprisoned. Cecilia is devastated…

However, in a later scene, Briony apologises to this couple for lying about this incident after they have reunited and she has attended Lola’s wedding and remembered the true assaulter. Robbie and Cecilia met up just before he was drafted to war in 1940 on his release from prison. Cecilia had loyally supported him despite his accusation. Later in the film, it appears that the pair reunited in a happy ending after the war ends.. but there is a major twist in this tale. 

I’m not going to say more about the film, as to do so would involve a major spoiler. But I will say this is a beautifully filmed love story. McAvoy and Knightley had a sweet, natural and passionate on-screen chemistry. Their performances are mesmerising and I was totally invested in a happy ending for this on-screen pair.

Ronan won an Oscar nomination for her performance where she played her young character ambiguously. You are unclear if she has misunderstood sexual relationships or is jealous of her sister and in love with Robbie… and all seems answered in later flashbacks.

Honourable mentions for this trope – in this blog – where love finds a way a second time round in a movie must include The Notebook (2004), Hopscotch (1980), A Summer Place (1959). Mamma Mia (2008) and Robin and Marian (1976)… And more recommendations of former love interests are reunited in a TV soap opera have to include the prime time soap Dallas (1978-91) where three out of four of the Ewing brothers got remarried to the same woman and one of these Ewing boys also reunited with his childhood sweetheart, for a while anyway.

Other series featuring old flames included episodes of Charlie’s Angels (1976-81), The Dukes of Hazzard (1979-85), MASH (1972-83) and a Hart to Hart (1979-84) movie spin-off…  But whether these became eternal flames for those series regulars you will have to watch and see whether love burns in their heart once more.

 

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Don’t forget to read the other contributions for this topic on Wandering Through the Shelves link up HERE.

Tune in for my March 17th post on my three favourite movies with Body Parts in the title…

 

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