#Random Harvest
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RANDOM HARVEST (1942) + letterboxd reviews
#forever normal about this film........#random harvest#ronald colman#greer garson#films#my edit#my post#filmedit
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what classic romances do you think measure up to harriet and peter in gaudy night? i’m really craving more satisfying classic romance
Well, kind inquirer, I have a confession. I had read the Wimsey novels multiple times by the age of 16. Over the past 2+ decades, Peter and Harriet have taught me a lot of things, even if I have learned them more slowly and painfully than I would like (Lord, teach us to take our hearts and look them in the face...); even if I feel as though I have not salvaged as much as I could from life's various shipwrecks. The point is: no one measures up, not for me. My dear, if you have let me come as far as your work and your life... That said, I can offer some suggestions, presuming that you mean by "classic romance" romance that happens outside the genre parameters of romance novels. I'll start with the most classic and work my way forwards. [Under the cut for length!]
Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë (for obvious reasons, I imagine. Perhaps the thing I love most in romance is two intense weirdos deciding to love each other intensely and weirdly.)
Much Ado About Nothing, Shakespeare (I know I said I'd work my way forward, but then I said 'intense weirdos' and remembered my beloved Benedick and Beatrice. Beatrice, an unmarried woman in her uncle's household, interrupts men's political conversation to demand to know whether he's alive because she can't stand not knowing for a minute longer... and that's her opening line! and then they roast each other for 2 hours! I love them so much!)
Persuasion, Jane Austen (Anne is, I would argue, quietly intense, while Frederick is obviously so; he's also weird enough for both of them (affectionate.) I adore them, I support them, I wish them many decades of shocking society with how they look at each other across rooms. And dinner tables. And pianos. And dancing squares.)
Artists in Crime/Death in a White Tie, Ngaio Marsh (this is the Alleyn/Troy duology the way that Strong Poison/Have His Carcase/Gaudy Night is the Peter/Harriet trilogy. I adore Troy, an anxious and compassionate artist with gnc tendencies, and Alleyn fascinates me. Intense weirdos again. Alleyn successfully pretends to be normal most of the time, with everyone except about 3 people. Occasionally he decides to stop, or just does because he's very tired and fed up, and then everyone in the room gets very freaked out very quickly. I love him.)
The Case of William Smith, Patricia Wentworth (bonus detective round! Wentworth is not in the Sayers-Marsh class, and this novel has some tropes I don't like, but I love the gentleness of the central romance so much that I still reread it.)
Possession, A.S. Byatt (Victorian poets, the scholars who study them, the life of the mind and the life of the heart. This is absolutely a novel with Gaudy Night in its lineage.)
The French Lieutenant's Woman, John Fowles (I hesitated before adding this to the list, but it's a novel of ideas that is also about love and sex and identity and Englishness with a very vivid setting, so it might fit the bill?)
The English Patient, Michael Ondaatje ('I believe this. When we meet those we fall in love with, there is an aspect of our spirit that is historian, a bit of a pedant, who imagines or remembers a meeting when the other had passed by innocently...')
Charlotte Gray, Sebastian Faulks (Birdsong is the greater novel, but this one might be the one I prefer. I love Charlotte and her quest to find herself that is also a journey toward love! and vocation! and the images for the lovers in this book are indelible)
Bonus round of books I looked at on my shelf and decided were about so many things that the romance might not be central enough: The Children's Book, Love in the Time of Cholera, The Remains of the Day, The Portrait of a Lady, War and Peace, Brideshead Revisited.
Bonus bonus round, not a book: Random Harvest. Yes it is a book, but in the novel, the romance which truly is emotionally anchoring (I would argue) is much more peripheral than it is in the film, which was, like the Wimsey novels, formative for me. Also, look at them:
I have not been normal about the way he looks at her for *checks notes* 25 years. And I hope you find some things to enjoy here!
#long post#book recommendations#romance#two fiddlers both musicians#charlotte brontë#jane austen#sebastian faulks#ngaio marsh#a.s. byatt#john fowles#michael ondaatje#patricia wentworth#random harvest
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Greer Garson in Random Harvest (1942) dir. Mervyn LeRoy
#greer garson#random harvest#1942#1940s#drama#romance#mervyn leroy#oldhollywoodedit#classic hollywood
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i am once again thinking about the movie Random Harvest (1942) and how it is THE romantic film of all time
#that movie was made for the hopeless romantic (me)#i just think about that movie at least once a day im not joking#ronald colman#greer garson#i might do a powerpoint over analyzing every little aspect of that movie perhaps#random harvest
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Handsome Ronald Colman.
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so i watched one (1) movie and had to
#jaytim#tim drake#jason todd#red hood#red robin#random harvest#roppie tries to draw#emotionally i watched an old romance flick and got in surprisingly more feels than anticipated and ofc needed an outlet#intellectually i wanted to make an illustration with gradient mapping and this rlly cool brush i downloaded#i!!!!! was rlly happy when i finished this but looked at it enough to circle back to insecurity again but i hope y’all like!!!!#roppie and her inability to draw with anything other than blues pinks and oranges
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Ronald Colman and Greer Garson in Random Harvest 1942 🌸
#old hollywood#beauty#romantic drama#1940s cinema#historical drama#greer garson#ronald colman#the great war#ww1#1910s fashion#random harvest
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Random Harvest (1942)
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Greer Garson and Ronald Colman in Random Harvest 1942
#vintage#beauty#actress#hollywood#actor#classic actress#vintage actress#classic hollywood#classic film#classic movies#1942#greer garson#ronald colman#random harvest
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Why did Ronald Colman have the saddest eyes in the universe?
#ronald colman#a tale of two cities#a tale of two cities 1935#lost horizon#the prisoner of zenda#random harvest#fuck off me
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finally watched random harvest and it’s your fault 💕
Me pulling more people into this movie's tiny community of devotees:
In all seriousness, Anon, I'm delighted to know this!
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#Random Harvest#Ronald Colman#Greer Garson#Philip Dorn#Susan Peters#Henry Travers#Reginald Owen#Bramwell Fletcher#Mervyn LeRoy#1942
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Random Harvest (1942). dir. Mervyn LeRoy
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thinking about the last scene in Random Harvest when Paula calls for Smithy and you can literally see how he comes back to life only by the way he lift up his head while his back was TURN from the camera, ronald colman invented acting
#ronald colman#random harvest#i need to find a way to stop talking about this man watching his movies is NOT enough
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