You've Got Mail

1998’s You’ve Got Mail, directed by Nora Ephron.

Starring Tom Hanks, Meg Ryan, Greg Kinnear, Parker Posey, Dave Chapelle, Steve Zahn, Heather Burns, Deborah Rush, Dabney Coleman, John Randolph, and Jean Stapleton.

What is it about?

You’ve Got Mail is a New York centred film about 2 business people: Meg Ryan’s Kathleen Kelly, who owns and works at a independent children’s bookstore, and Tom Hanks’ Joe Fox, who works for his family’s corporate gigantic chain of bookstores. Joe sets up a franchise down the street from Kathleen’s location, and the 2 of them become rivals. Unbeknownst to the 2 of them, they have been online, chatting to each other. Will Kathleen’s business be able to stay afloat in an era of chain stores, and will they discover that they’ve been romantically communicating to each other as they’ve competed in business?

Why is it worth seeing?

You’ve Got Mail is a 90’s Rom Com staple, a collection of heavy hitters put together to capitalize on their immense popularity at a time when the internet’s world of connectivity was taking off. At time, Mail was a monster hit- which obscures how it has dated so poorly and features one of the more unlikable characters in film history displaying so much cognitive dissonance.

Director/Producer/Co-Writer Nora Ephron sprung to fame with her more seminal works, When Harry Met Sally and Sleepless in Seattle. While romantic studio comedies have been a staple of Hollywood as long as it’s been, well, Hollywood, Ephron had a unique voice to a classical genre that resonated with people. Mail loses that unique voice, in favour of market testing- and one notable stomach churning exception.

Hanks’, who was riding one of Hollywood’s most historically prolific hot streaks at the time, stars here as a multi millionaire businessman who quotes The Godfather, while trying to be a nice guy online and having an aunt who is a quarter his age. But what the trailer never tells you is he is a precursor to a phenomenon that came to be known as, Catfishing. The term may not completely apply, as Hanks’ character doesn’t set out to be a deceptive creep at first. But as he efficiently wipes out his rival’s livelihood, he also keeps tabs on her with his online personality, while spying on her and trying to befriend her in the real world- you know, a creep masquerading as a nice guy. It’s spine tingling in its misguidedness. Given the movie’s genre, can you guess how it turns out? It’s tough to say if it’s more of a tragedy that a woman wrote the script (who was renowned for her views on realistic female voices), or that Meg Ryan’s limited appeal was celebrated for her character’s choices. Did this movie really make a quarter of a billion dollars for advertising itself as a Casablanca when its characters’ actions are closer to Vertigo?

Social mores out of the way, one can focus on the film’s craft. In terms of performances, Hanks, who as noted above was incendiary at the time, suffers from not having more kinetic directors such as Ron Howard, Robert Zemeckis, Jonathan Demme, and Steven Spielberg guide him, and his performance feels more like something from the period before he was a Academy Award nominee regular (think Turner and Hooch). Ryan, whom was also very popular for her cuteness appeal at the time, is perfectly fine. But as a couple- they have minimal chemistry, even as the plot machinations chug along. They just don’t seem to like each other. You feel more of it when Hanks’ Parker Posey partner (do you think he leaves her to get with Ryan?) and Ryan’s partner, Greg Kinnear (do you think she leaves him to get with Hanks?) meet, or even when Kinnear is flirting with a television interviewer. It’s never a good thing in a rom com for the protagonists to be the fourth most compelling relationship. I also found myself begging for less of the main actors, and more Dave Chapelle, whom is so great as Hanks’ co-worker/friend. A few years later, his career would appropriately explode when he got his own show. Perhaps the main actors’ lack of chemistry can be explained by John Lindley’s grubby 90’s cinematography- it’s pretty cruddy.

The internet and how it would come to be used was an extraordinary experiment back in the 1990’s. But scenes of characters typing through it (Social Network notwithstanding), are pretty boring. What a lot of movie professionals forget is that the computer is just a typewriter with more electricity- meaning just because people are using it, doesn’t mean it makes for much tension or interest. But the movie tested well with focus groups. And that’s the theme here. People lined up to watch a fantasy film marketed as a New York meet cute, and came away mostly oblivious to the predatory stalking by the 1990’s most popular actor. In a world of injustice, at least AOL got what it deserved.

Rating:

2.5/5

Trailer: Click Here.