Director: Nora Ephron
Cast: Tom Hanks, Meg Ryan, Parker Posey, Greg Kinnear
Have I Seen it Before: Many, many times. Greg Kinnear’s character might have seeped into my brain a little bit.
Did I Like It: Remember when this movie was released and it seemed like it was a love story for the foreseeable future? Dial up connections, America On-Line, and the impenetrable power of the large bookstore chain.
Now, it’s possibly even more quaint than its ancestors The Shop Around the Corner (1940) and In the Good Old Summertime (1949). A subsequent, more current remake of the film would only work as a horror movie. Which now that I think about it, I need to go make a note in another document… The Greg Kinnear character can still use AOL if it makes everyone feel a sense of unearned of comfort.
On that note, I’m struggling to think of a film more designed to—and succeeds to—comfort from moment to moment. Hanks and Ryan—the end result of a long-dormant government experiment to create beings of pure likability—are at the top of their collective game*, and that’s in a film where demonstrably, Hanks is playing the villain. Imagining a world where everyone from the corporate fat cat to the plucky underdog is fueled entirely by being good with a turn of phrase when they’re not eye-ball deep in a book is more romance than anyone ought to get from a single movie.
And sure, the triumph of true love against odds in a world of increasingly impersonalized communications has its charms, but that ain’t what keeps me coming back to the movie.
*Yep, I’m putting this one ahead of When Harry Met Sally (1989) and Sleepless in Seattle (1993). Come and fight me about Nora Ephron films, if you feel the need.