To conclude our series on romantic summer films set in Italy, we look at “September Affair”, a weepie from 1950, an era in which it was considered rather daring…
In this 1950 film produced by Hal B Wallis and directed by William Dieterle, Joan Fontaine is Marianne “Manina” Stuart, an expatriate American pianist and Joseph Cotten is David Lawrence, an American industrialist. The two meet on a flight from Rome to New York and, when their plane is diverted to Naples for an engine check, they decide to go sightseeing and have lunch, during which they play a gramophone record of Walter Huston singing “September Song” by Kurt Weill and Maxwell Anderson. They linger too long over lunch and miss their flight so they explore Capri and Pompeii together.
A few days later, they learn that the plane crashed and their names are on the list of the dead. By now they are falling in love and, both in unhappy marriages, they decide to start a new life together in Italy. They go to Florence, where they rent a villa – a transaction for which, strangely, no documents are required – and, rather callously, make no contact with their families. In a restaurant in Florence, Manina plays “September Song” and an American soldier played by Jimmy Lydon sings it. Slowly guilty feelings come to the surface and David begins to think of his son.
Finally David’s wife, played by Jessica Tandy, arrives in Italy and learns the truth. David and Manina realise they have to go back to their normal lives but they will never forget their time together.
The plot may seem improbable, the Italian characters stereotypical and the dialogue between the two lovers verbose but in its time the film, with its portrayal of two people who were not married to each other living together in a sexual relationship, was considered daring. Today it is chiefly remembered for propelling the twelve-year-old “September Song” to the top of the hit parade.
