A Walk in the Moon

I. [From Luther Wright (www.videoflicks.com)]:

Portrait of Jennie is one of the most hauntingly romantic films I can recall ever watching. The stunning black & white cinematography often emulates the surface of the artist's canvas, while the music score weaves a tender, other-worldly tapestry of its own. Jennifer Jones is perfectly cast as the lovely, yet strangely sad and from-another-time Jennie Appleton. Joseph Cotten draws the viewer's sympathy as the struggling, starving artist, Eben Adams. Ethel Barrymore's portrayal of Adams' friend and mentor, Miss Spinney, adds strength to the film, and the first lady of the American film, Lillian Gish, offers Adams gentle and comforting grace as Sister Mary of Mercy. The film's final, stunning touch is the framed portrait of Jennie, revealed in gorgeous, glorious Technicolor, over which Jennie's voice is heard to repeat words spoken earlier to Eben Adams.... "Oh! Eben! Is it really me? I think some day it will hang in a great museum, and that it will make you famous!" This movie is a must-see for anyone who has felt the emptiness and lonliness of being a star-crossed lover. "From world's end to world's end there is only one true love, one you must search for until you find them..."

II. [From Brian Koller (http://briankoller.epinions.com)]:

Jennifer Jones became a star in 1943, with her leading role in The Song of Bernadette. Her performance captured the attention of film mogul David O. Selznick. He would eventually produce seven films starring the lovely, ethereal Jones. The Portrait of Jennie was the last film they would make together before their marriage in 1949. Joseph Cotten plays Eben, a poverty-stricken painter struggling to find commissions during the Great Depression. His only friend is kindly cab driver Gus (David Wayne). Eben tries to sell his drawings to an art gallery controlled by Miss Spinney (Ethel Barrymore), but is told that his work is mediocre. Nonetheless, Spinney takes a maternal interest in him, especially after she sees a drawing that he made of a radiant girl that he met in the park. Eben has subsequent encounters with the girl, whose name is Jennie (Jennifer Jones). Jennie is sweet but acts strangely, as if she belongs to another era. Eben is fascinated with her, and she provides the inspiration that is lacking in his work. But the more he learns about her, the more obvious it becomes that she is a spirit, seen only by him. Look for silent film star Lillian Gish in a small supporting role as the head of a convent.

Most of the film is photographed in black and white. However, the final shot, that of the finished portrait of Jennie, is in technicolor. This technique was also used in The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945), which was only in color when the title subject was on camera. One of Eben's specialties was landscapes. Often, there are scene-opening shots in the film that resemble his paintings. On several occasions, a filter is used for the camera that makes it look like we are seeing a moving painting on canvas. For his efforts, Joseph August received an Oscar nomination for Best B&W Cinematography. But the Academy Award that was given to The Portrait of Jennie was for its special effects. The climactic scene takes place during a heavy storm, on a rocky seashore facing a lighthouse. The storm is very impressive, especially as it was done in an era before computer animated wizardry.

...[T]he chemistry between Joseph Cotten and Jennifer Jones is present, as always. They would make five films together, most of them with Selznick as producer. Cotten's gentle weariness is complimented by Jones' childlike, strangely luminescent screen presence. Selznick's meticulous efforts as a producer were legendary, and were again rewarded by the quality of the casting, performances, and screenplay. Selznick would again cast Cotten as the leading man the following year in one of his greatest films, The Third Man.

III. [From The Great Romantic Films by Lawrence J. Quirk (Secaucus, NJ: Citadel Press, 1974)]:

"An ageless love can cross frontiers of time and death, and neither time nor space need be a barrier to those who refuse to find them so. . . ." This expresses the essential philosophy of the David 0. Selznick production, Portrait of Jennie, an affecting study of a supernatural romance that showcased Jennifer Jones at her most ethereal and gave Joseph Cotten one of his more winning characterizations.

William Dieterle directed this tasteful film, shot in 1947 on location in New York and New England, and released in early 1949. Based on the delicate mood-piece novella "Portrait of Jennie," by Robert Nathan, published in 1940, it deals with a young New York painter (Cotten), down on his luck in the Depression year 1932, who despairs because his work lacks depth and pictorial allusiveness. He is encouraged by a motherly art dealer, Ethel Barry-more, who buys his watercolors and urges him to find new avenues of expression.

One day he meets Jennie Appleton. (Miss Jones), a little girl dressed in old-fashioned clothing, in Central Park. He finds the encounter a strangely haunting one, and it is repeated over the months from winter through spring into summer, with the little girl maturing into an adolescent and then into a young woman on the verge of college graduation. Jennie is strange, speaks of things long past, her speech and manner redolent of another era. Yet she and Eben, the painter, establish a spiritual intimacy, and soon he is in love with her.

He persuades her on one of her unexpected visits to pose for a portrait, and when he finishes it and shows it