Review: You've Got Mail
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You've Got Mail
More like "You've Got One Boring Film". I'm sorry. Maybe I'm just a cynical 19 year old, but is anyone else incredibly tired of this sort of predictable romantic nonsense that would never happen in reality?
Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan back together with their "Sleepless In Seattle" director Nora Ephron, yet again. The dialogue here actually starts off alright, with Hanks playing the head of a chain of "Borders-like" book stores. The kind of book stores where people seem to live there, reading a book or two, relaxing on a couch, getting more coffee, reading more, etc.
Meg Ryan plays the owner of a competing store down the block, a historical landmark that has been in the neighborhood for years; you see this kind of store across the country as well; everything is laid out with care, the people who work there know your name and care to bring you the best service. It's a nicely decorated children's book store.
Hanks is dating indie film goddess Parker Posey, who has a great little performance that I would have liked to have seen more of; it's the fast talking bit that she always makes so funny and so charming; in fact, for the most part, it's the secondary actors in this film that have more promising and funny characters than the leads.The very funny Dave Chapelle, who also starred in "Con Air", gets only a couple of minutes time as Hanks's assistant. In fact, even Greg Kinnear, who plays Ryan's original boyfriend, seems to have had most of his screentime cut as well; all in the matter of bringing the focus closer on the bland lead characters.
Don't get me wrong, I like Tom Hanks as an actor. Meg Ryan is fine, but she's done this bit far better and with far more spirit in "French Kiss" and even last year's "Addicted To Love".
So, getting back to the story(I sound oh-so-excited about this film from this review, don't I?), Hanks is getting further and further on Ryan's nerves as his bookstore becomes an ever-increasing force in the neighborhood; we see countless shots of Ryan looking out the window, sad and denying the fact that her store is going out of business. Aside from the first verbal duels between Ryan and Hanks, the walls between the two are brought down a little too quickly and a little too predictably as the two become ever closer and somewhat less annoyed with each other.
Some of the dialogue between the two in the early scenes of the two talking over email and with their friends, etc, is very good; especially scenes like Hanks talking about how he's planning to get the neighborhood on his side as he walks through the construction site of his new store. It has sort of a "Woody Allen Light" feeling. Or, "One Calorie Woody Allen". But, as the two get ever closer together over email and in real life, the dialogue becomes the standard romantic cliche fare. I sort of like the concept, people who hate each other in real life are in love on the net, but why then go about making such a bland film? Why does Nora Epron direct the same film over and over and over? These are the questions I must ask.
Again, maybe I'm a cynical guy, but am I the only one in the universe who feels annoyed by the predictability and mechanical nature of these films? I guess so.
Sometimes I feel so alone.
**