Reincarnation romance films are sometimes silly, mostly melodramatic, but always overlooked as a subgenre. Usually an excuse for the costume department to dig into their luxurious period back catalogues, these cinematic gems are hidden in plain sight across time and space, from the Pre-Code era to modern contention at the Venice Film Festival. There’s an inexplicable magic to these movies that keeps me coming back again and again (…and again…) which leaves me to wonder: did I love them in my past life too?
I should define exactly what I mean by ‘reincarnation romances’. Fantasy was a popular genre throughout the 1930s and ‘40s, testing the capabilities of the growing cinematic form with the latest visual effects technology and providing much-needed extraordinary escapism to countries first combating economic depression then a Second World War. I’d argue this subgenre – centring tropes of eternally youthful-looking stars loving each other irrespective of time, hardship and even death – was born out of a need for spiritual comfort at a time of youth death unprecedented in scale. Indeed, the niche saw a small resurgence in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, likely as a result of the AIDs epidemic which similarly wiped out a generation of otherwise healthy people with their whole lives ahead of them.
As for the movies themselves, most deal with a man who is either cursed with immortality or memories of his past life pursuing an unaware reincarnation of his ‘one true love’. This can be devastatingly tragic and romantic, like in personal favourite Pandora and the Flying Dutchman (1951), or haunting and horrifying, like in Universal’s 1932 classic The Mummy. Sometimes, perhaps the more socially conscious entries in the genre include the woman remembering her past lives in order to break free from generational cycles of mistreatment and abuse. Whether she succeeds or succumbs to the inevitable pull of true love depends: I Married a Witch – a spellbindingly silly screwball comedy – ends with the expected Hays Code-ordained marriage after an enchantingly entertaining enemies-to-lovers back-and-forth, while Timestalker – a witty subversion of the genre – has Alice Lowe’s lead realise she’s falling for Mr. Wrong in every time period. This niche could easily be confused with what I call ‘second-chance reincarnation’ stories such as Ghost, Here Comes Mr Jordan or A Matter of Life and Death, but crucially those don’t involve such a long time span, and aren’t so anchored to the fantastical.
What I love most about this subgenre is its sheer versatility: reincarnation romances easily slot into wider narratives of comedy, horror, drama and mystery. Even Alfred Hitchcock toyed with the tropes in what his considered his masterpiece, Vertigo (if you’re a fan of Hitchcock and want to see the trope played ‘straight’, I humbly beg you check out Kenneth Branagh’s Dead Again for a melodramatic yet loving pastiche with an incredible cast). Their appeal also derives from their unwavering focus on the feminine experience: the leads are always female – conniving, curious, compassionate… multi-faceted! – and when their darker elements are played up the horror comes from forcing women into roles they were ‘born into’, but reject. Take 1948’s Corridor of Mirrors for example, co-written by lead actress Edana Romney, where Eric Portman’s obsessed artist attempts to coerce Romney into his reincarnation fantasy, isolating her from husband and wider society. Though she enjoys the freedoms of sexual expression, she can’t stand literally being in another woman’s shoes, whether hers from a past life or not. 1942’s Malombra takes on similar themes, leaning on analysis of hysteria; 2023’s The Beast confronts incel culture and women ‘owing’ men companionship in a fascinating way; while 1992’s Candyman may be the most chilling and compelling case yet. All I highly recommend.
Besides the romantic content of the films’ stories, we can also consider the lost art of repeatedly casting couples overflowing with sexual chemistry a kind of ‘reincarnation romance’. Back in the days of the studio system, if producers caught sparks flying between a pair of the silver screen’s finest stars, they did not let it slide. There’s no greater guaranteed joy than settling down to watch Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers; William Powell and Myrna Loy; Katharine Hepburn and Cary Grant fall in and out of love in as many as ten different lifetimes and stories. It really makes you wonder why we don’t know when we have a good thing nowadays. Sure, there are three starring vehicles for Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks, but where is my follow-up on Timothy Dalton and Fran Drescher after Beautician and the Beast? I had best hope David Jonsson and Vivian Oparah will be paired again after 2023’s modern classic Rye Lane, otherwise I will have to have a stern word.
At a time where streaming services and studios are churning out lifeless ‘reincarnations’ (or rather ghoulish ‘reanimations’) of old favourites like there’s no tomorrow, I urge you to look for the classics of yesterday and give them a go! I expect readers of the modern ‘Romantasy’ trend in literature would find plenty to enjoy in these dark romances with atmospheric black-and-white cinematography; beautifully eloquent performances in period costume; and stories with eternities’ worth of yearning that will stick with you throughout this lifetime… and perhaps the next.
