Actually, "The Way We Were" is both, and happily so. It's a classy romantic period drama about a 1940s wallflower in New York who blooms in love with her ex-jock boyfriend (an old acquaintance from their college days), and the movie overflows with star-power. None of today's celebrities have the kind of chemistry Barbra Streisand and Robert Redford bring to the screen, and Streisand in particular is so deeply into this character that the herky-jerky editing and breathless writing don't harm her or get in the way (the faults can easily be overlooked). When writer Redford adapts his novel into a screenplay and the couple marries and moves to Hollywood in the McCarthy-Blacklist era, her passion for politics gets them both in hot water; that's where this script hits a snag, with increasingly melodramatic plotting (Redford's affair with a former flame) and confusion in the character motivations (this primarily due to hasty, eleventh-hour editing). Still, it is a handsomely-produced movie with a great tearjerker ending and two fine stars who plow right through the nonsense and bumpy continuity. They transcend the make-believe surroundings, turning the picture into something really special, something to remember. ***1/2 from ****
