Dear Heart

Evie, the postmistress of a small town, comes to New York for a postmasters' convention. Staying in the same hotel is a greeting-card salesman long on the road; he is engaged and about to marry. The two put each other off for a few days. The film is not interested in romance. It is interested in the bustle of loneliness: Evie talks to everyone, learns everyone's name and is forever organising something, and the only reason is that she does not want to go home. The film does not find her ridiculous. The form is enclosed: hotel lobby, corridors, convention hall and a few streets. Almost all of it happens in one building. Delbert Mann directed. He came from television and was known for Marty; this comes from the same vein, made of small people's small desperations. The title song, written by Henry Mancini with lyrics by Jay Livingston and Ray Evans, was nominated for an Academy Award. Geraldine Page plays Evie, Glenn Ford the salesman and Angela Lansbury the fiancée. Who it is for: viewers who like sixties chamber comedy-drama and Geraldine Page. Who it is not for: anyone expecting a brisk romantic comedy. It is slow, the plot is thin and the resolution is visible from the start.