If there was ever one thing every one could agree about David Niven is he had no small amount of debonair charm. It got him through many a film when the role required little else. I would say that is the case in Eternally Yours.
Loretta Young, granddaughter of Episcopalian minister C. Aubrey Smith, meets and falls in love with a magician. That would be David Niven. But he's more than a magician, he's the current Houdini wannabe who has skill as a hypnotist and an escape artist.
Niven likes the life of a traveling entertainer, but Loretta wants to settle down with a home. After a death defying leap from a plane when he's handcuffed behind him, Young can't deal with the tension any more and she leaves him. He finds he can't go on without her, but she ups and divorces him and marries Broderick Crawford.
Of course the rest of the film is about Niven winning Young back in the best tradition of Cary Grant who may very well have been offered this part before Niven. Loretta is certainly worth winning back. I'm betting that Ralph Bellamy turned down the Ralph Bellamy part so Broderick Crawford was cast. Niven enjoys tweaking him in this film, but I'm not sure why unlike Bellamy who was usually a well meaning goof, Crawford didn't just punch him out.
The climax takes place at the 1939 World's Fair and you might want to see Eternally Yours for some nostalgia footage of that event. But it is a film that really does get by on the charm of its leads.
