One of the hard lessons of growing up, we learn at the end of this Erich Segal tearjerker, is that nobody is perfect. But people in Erich Segal tearjerkers come close. The titular man, for instance, is chairman of a university Humanities department, bribes potential drop-outs with guaranteed A's, and speaks in a gentle, throaty purr that would calm madmen and tame wild animals. His students, unlike some undergraduates, come into class already well versed in obscure biographical details of Walt Whitman's life. His wife -- and the titular woman -- is a nonfiction editor for a prestigious academic publisher. Between them, they have two lovely daughters, ages twelve and ten, the elder of whom uses words like "punctilious" when she's not speaking in French. So, where, then, is there a ripple in this placid scene? Well, it happens that the man had once had a two-day, secret affair (a nearly perfect affair, naturellement, with a beautiful French physician who could hold her own in a discussion of Baudelaire, and who was equally adept at explaining the song "Plaisir d'Amour" to a non-French speaker: "It's about the joy and sorrow of life"), and the affair, it also happens, produced a child, now an orphan. This whole brew can make the viewer a little giddy. But giddiness is somewhat held in check by the earnest acting of Martin Sheen and Blythe Danner, and by the yogurt-y visual texture whipped up by director Dick Richards and cinematographer Richard Kline. (1983) — Duncan Shepherd