Perfect Strangers (1945)

To me, this movie is perfection.

Good start, but then it gets ruined

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

Rather dull affair with married couple Deborah Kerr and Robert Donat on their way to quite an abysmal marriage only to have World War 11 interrupt,and separated by service for 3 years, they meet on leave and find out that they have matured from the war years. The maturity is not shown; suddenly, they're totally different people. The film, of supposed comic blend, then briefly shows how they get back to one another.Glynnis Johns is wasted here as Kerr's colleague. 15 years later the two would receive Oscar nominations for their work in The Sundowners.The film in question needed much more action and certainly a better script for the actors to work properly.

Sometimes I wish I had grown up in England so I could get a firmer grasp on British sensibility and sense of humor. I tried hard to 'get into' this picture but I did not find it absorbing or particularly interesting. I watched it because it starred two very fine actors in Deborah Kerr and Robert Donat, and they gave it their best, which is a considerable output. Of course, I didn't live through WWII and have no idea of the mindset of those who were so close to it. I experienced no bombings or hid from a blitz and did not have to fight for the very existence of my country and my way of life, but somehow I think it must have been more of an adventure, for lack of a better word. And so, I think I am right when I say this picture would mean more to native-born English than to myself.I thought the post-war scenes in and around the pub were failed attempts at comedy, and that Ann Todd looked lovely in her brief appearance, but I grew up in the States and, truth be told, this movie missed the mark as a compelling narrative for this Yank.

The first two thirds of this movie are perfect! The remaking of Robert and Catherine is depicted in the subtle way I wanted it done. And the mirroring of their war experiences worked very well. At the same points in the movie they were made over, they were heroes, they were attracted to other people. It was utterly predictable, but surprise wasn't the point. The point was to tease out their reunion into a deliciously excruciating wait, and that worked. I was right there for it the whole time—and then they botched the ending. Instead of taking pains with the nuances of the couple's becoming interested in each other again—which could have been achingly romantic—we get a short cut: a dumb marital squabble that is out of character with their new war-forged maturity. Ah well. It was really close.

"Perfect Strangers" probably told a very true tale for many married people who got together after WWII. Robert Donat and Deborah Kerr are married before WWII and get back together again to find out they are strangers. It is a well-told story and well cast. Mr. Donat had three legendary leading ladies in this movie: Deborah Kerr, Glynis Johns, and Ann Todd. All three ladies were starting their careers. Mr. Donat seem to be cast well with all his leading ladies in all his few movies.