Tears in the Rain is a 1988 television film directed by Don Sharp and starring Sharon Stone and Christopher Cazenove. It was one of a series of films produced in the Harlequin Romance Movie Series (USA).
It was one of the last films directed by Australian Don Sharp.
The film is based on the novel of the same name written by Pamela Wallace and published in the Silhouette Special Edition line of romance novels in 1985 by Simon & Schuster before the Silhouette brand was acquired by Harlequin. There are alterations to the plot line made by the screenwriter but the essential story has stayed the same. The action and events take place in two time periods in England, the 1940s and the 1980s. The World War Two story is told in flashbacks.
Plot
Casey Cantrell (Sharon Stone) sets off for the UK to personally take a letter to Lord Richard Bredon, the last request of her late mother. A failed attempt to find him at his country residence has her falling from a wall into the arms of Lord Bredon's playboy son, Michael (Christopher Cazenove). Casey manages to escape his grilling without giving her name, but the younger Bredon tracks her to an inn in the local village where he uses his clout to get it.
Casey accepts his dinner invitation in order to learn the whereabouts of his father. The evening is spent with the two trying to get information from each other. It ends with neither one being any more informed than when it started. Wanting to see her again and to continue to try and solve her mystery Michael convinces her to visit Bredon Hall the next day. While she is there, Michael's flamboyant best friend Hamdan al Dubai (Leigh Lawson) arrives. Not unexpectedly based on their mutual history, Hamdan immediately starts expressing an interest in Casey much to Michael’s annoyance. After Casey learns that Michael's father is in London, she accepts an offer made by Hamdan to go back there with him.
Continuing her quest, Casey finds Lord Bredon at his office in Half Moon Square. While visibly shaken by the news of Jessie's death, he denies ever having known her and refuses to accept the letter. Instead of deterring her, Richard's confusing reaction only serves to make her more determined to uncover the mystery. Meanwhile a still suspicious but intrigued Michael has found her again and asks her out for the following day
The next day Hamdan calls to charm Casey into having lunch with him on his yacht. Michael, upon finding out her plans with Hamden, shows up at lunch uninvited. The talk switches to a discussion of the party going on at Hamdan's house that evening. Hamdan invites her to the event but it's not until she finds out Lord Bredon is going to be there that she accepts. Later that evening as Casey is modeling her dress for the party, Michael happens to see that she's wearing a necklace that reminds him of his family crest. When she claims that it belonged to her mother, he persists in trying to talk about it, but she laughingly blows off the conversation.
At the party Casey and Michael have a confrontation with his father who accuses her of being a con artist and tells his son about her trip to his office. Michael, who has a deep fear of being taken in by a woman, immediately lays into her. Casey becomes distraught by both men attacking her and runs off. Michael chases after her ultimately cornering her in a garden house where they end up in a passionate embrace. He agrees to hear her side of the story and the pair leave the party.
Before his own departure, Richard has a flashback revealing the nature of his relationship with Jessie. Still concerned that Casey is trouble, Richard asks Hamdan to dig up information on her. Hamdan expresses his discomfort with the situation, but this falls on deaf ears.
Michael and Casey arrive at his apartment after her having told him the story about the letter on the way there. The two reexamine the pendant with him verifying that is the family crest. Casey and Michael end up sleeping together after the postulating theories about how Jessie and Richard knew each other. Meanwhile Richard is lost in his own memories about their meeting and Jessie’s connection to a Bredon family friend, Emily.