When last we saw them, Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks were walking onto an elevator with tentative plans to move back to Seattle. They have since moved to New York and taken jobs in the book business (and new identities, by the way). Kathleen Kelly (Ryan) runs a quaint little children's bookstore, which she inherited from her mother, called The Shop Around the Corner. Business is steady until Fox Books, a popular bookstore chain, opens a store right around the corner from Kelly's shop. Joe Fox (Hanks), the main proprietor of these bargain bins of literature, runs the business with his father (Dabney Coleman) and his grandfather (John Randolph).
The Shop and Fox Books immediately engage in a PR war, with Kelly's boyfriend (Greg Kinnear) writing diatribes touting the small businessman that rival Dennis Miller's rants in the New York Observer, while Fox's best friend and associate (Dave Chappelle) reminds him that people will still come to Fox Books for the cheap books and caffeinated beverages. All the while, Kelly and Fox are enchanting one another through anonymous e-mails with banter about buying bouquets of pencils for fall and seeing butterflies on the subway. Fox realizes that his beloved ShopGirl is Kelly before she realizes that her NY152 is him, giving him the upper-hand to come and sweep her off her feet.
You can't really mind a film like You've Got Mail: It's too sufficient and charming to hate and far too confidently middle-brow to be loved. The ideas and cultural tomes that are presented are all used for basic appeal: The Godfather is quoted only to the extent of its masculine fandom, Pride & Prejudice is brought up but only so far as its feminine ideology. There are no laughs to be found: It's all brief chuckles, occasional giggles, and consistent smirks at light NYC references and communal embarrassments. Even the internet, the film's chief cultural icon, is only really discussed briefly between Kelly and her aunt Birdy (Jean Stapleton) in reference to cyber sex (which was so 1996).
What is the cosmic alignment that makes the idea of Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan ending up together so appealing? Ryan has a chirpy tone and amusingly quick way of speaking mixed with that aura of mild mischief and the short haircut; Kevin Kline summed it up as 'like a boy but not' in French Kiss. Hanks is that patented everyman that is more cute than handsome and has that way of talking that makes everything he utters sound like a vaguely-interesting argument. Somehow, this works.
It might have nothing to do with the actors' abilities and more to do with their complacency; they are both excessively comforting without any real sense of passion. When passions do come up, they are quickly lowered to a whisper to coax you back into the slumber of aimless good-humor. And that's exactly what You've Got Mail is: a big comfy pillow that seems fine with not saying anything or doing anything until the credits roll.
