Love Story

Love Story (1970) is a sentimental, romantic tearjerker film from director Arthur Hiller about a tragic couple. [Hiller had passed up the opportunity to work on The Godfather(1972) to make this film.] The melodramatic soap-opera, tremendously popular and a financial success (the top-earning film of the year) but panned by critics for its sappy content, was based upon Erich Segal's best-selling short novel of the same name. The film's tagline, "Love means never having to say you're sorry," appeared slightly differently in Segal's novelization: "Love means not ever having to say you're sorry."

The catchy, haunting, piano-plinking score won the Best Original Score Oscar (the film's sole award) for Francis Lai from its seven Academy Awards nominations: Best Picture, Best Actor (Ryan O'Neal), Best Supporting Actor (John Marley), Best Actress (Ali MacGraw), Best Director (Arthur Hiller), and Best Original Story and Screenplay (Erich Segal). Beau Bridges, Michael York, Michael Douglas, Jon Voight, Michael Sarrazin and Peter Fonda all turned down the part of Oliver - which ultimately went to Ryan O'Neal.

This film rescued Paramount from total bankruptcy (it was the 9th most profitable studio at the time), and began an incredible streak of major successes under Paramount VP of development Robert Evans' stewardship, including Harold and Maude (1971), The Godfather (1972), Play it again, Sam (1972), The Getaway (1972), Serpico (1973), The Great Gatsby (1974), Chinatown (1974), Marathon Man (1976) and Black Sunday (1977). An inferior sequel was produced later in the decade - Oliver's Story (1978) pairing a still-grieving Ryan O'Neal with Candice Bergen.

Told as a flashback, this is an uncomplicated love story between two star-crossed lovers-students, Harvard pre-law hockey player Oliver Barrett IV (Ryan O'Neal) and Radcliffe music student Jenny Cavilleri (Ali MacGraw). Oliver narrates the opening line of the film, looking back:

What can you say about a twenty-five-year-old girl who died? That she was beautiful and brilliant? That she loved Mozart and Bach, the Beatles, and me?

Their love triumphs over different economic-class backgrounds (he is a "preppie millionaire," she a smart-mouthed "social zero" from a blue-collar Italian/American family). Their main obstacle to romance is that his rich, powerful and snobbish father, Oliver Barrett III (Ray Milland) objects and threatens to cut off funding: "Oliver, if you marry her now, I'll not give you the time of day." To which the younger, bull-headed Oliver defiantly asks: "What offends you more, Father, that she's Catholic, or poor?" He ultimately responds: "Father, you don't know the time of day." The two young lovers marry anyway and first move into a small apartment in Cambridge before Oliver is hired by a New York law firm and they move to the city.

The film's two most touching and remembered scenes are their prolonged kissing scene and the montage of the couple tossing snowballs at each other. After meeting many obstacles and making sacrifices, she is diagnosed as terminally ill when she is tested for pregnancy, and dies in his arms at the hospital in a tear-inducing closing. She makes a last request of him: "You, after all - you're going to be a merry widower." "I won't be merry," he responds. She replies: "Yes, you will be. I want you to be merry. You'll be merry, okay?"

In the final scene, Oliver quotes his late wife, when speaking to his father about their past misunderstandings. After his father tells him he's sorry that she has died, Oliver responds in the last memorable line of the film, quoting an earlier remark of Jenny's:

Love means never having to say you're sorry.

He then walks out into a snowy Central Park to contemplate what life might have been in a touching finale, as the award-winning musical score builds in the background.

Created in 1996-2007 © by Tim Dirks

Love Story by Fan Yi Chen


爱的故事有很多　你一定听过
ai de gu shi you hen duo ni yi ding ting guo
她们说　最美的爱情像湖泊
ta men shuo zui mei de ai qing xiang hu bo
美的忍不住停留　而任性的风
mei de ren bu zhu ting liu er ren xing de feng
吹过了　却飘下一片片叶落
chui guo le que piao xia yi pian pian ye luo

放~开手往北方走留下伤心的树独自忍受
fang~kai shou wang bei fang zou liu xia shang xin de shu du zi ren shou
你离开我连一句话都不说
ni li kai wo lian yi ju hua duo bu shuo
只默默看着今晚天空星光闪烁
zhi mo mo kan zhe jin wan xing guang shan shuo

看今夜的流星　划过了天际　笑我的心
kan jin yeh de liu xin hua guo le tian ji xiao wo de xin
我无法再冷静请你要倾听你是我的唯一
wo wu fa zai leng jing qing ni yao qing ting ni shi wo de wei yi
我不愿去相信我们之间隔著海洋的距离
wo bu yuan qu xiang xin wo men zhi jian ge zhe hai yang de ju li
我的爱　已融化在空气里
wo de ai yi rong hua zai kong qi li

爱的故事有很多　你一定听过
ai de gu shi you hen duo ni yi ding ting guo
她们说　最美的爱情像湖泊
ta men shuo zui mei de ai qing xiang hu bo
美的忍不住停留　而任性的风
mei de ren bu zhu ting liu er ren xing de feng
吹过了　却飘下一片片叶落
chui guo le que piao xia yi pian pian ye luo

放~开手往北方走留下伤心的树独自忍受
fang~kai shou wang bei fang zou liu xia shang xin de shu du zi ren shou
你离开我连一句话都不说
ni li kai wo lian yi ju hua duo bu shuo
只默默看着今晚天空星光闪烁
zhi mo mo kan zhe jin wan xing guang shan shuo

看今夜的流星　划过了天际　笑我的心
kan jin yeh de liu xin hua guo le tian ji xiao wo de xin
我无法再冷静请你要倾听你是我的唯一
wo wu fa zai leng jing qing ni yao qing ting ni shi wo de wei yi
我不愿去相信我们之间隔著海洋的距离
wo bu yuan qu xiang xin wo men zhi jian ge zhe hai yang de ju li
我的爱　已融化在空气里
wo de ai yi rong hua zai kong qi li