A Hot Dog Is Singing
I needed a night out, and although I had originally bought two tickets to the 25th Anniversary screening of You’ve Got Mail at Circle Cinema, I decided I was perfectly content to go alone. Over the years I’ve become less and less insecure about the idea of going by myself to the movies, or out to dinner, or to a concert. Oftentimes it’s the perfect elixir to soothe an anxious heart and refresh the soul.
I confidently found my seat with my glass of red wine, and not long after, a couple of older women sat next to me. I overheard one of them trying to explain to the other that YGM was based on a play, and I couldn’t resist joining in and adding that it was also a movie called The Shop Around The Corner with Jimmy Stewart. She was very kind and not at all bothered by my eavesdropping (and my uncharacteristic convo-crashing). We chatted about a few different things, mostly regarding rom-coms starring Meg Ryan. She finally asked me if I was there alone, and I said “yes, that’s just how much I love this movie!”— trying to deflect from the obvious embarrassment she felt immediately after asking the question. It’s ok, sweet lady. I am actually quite happy to be going solo today.
Long after the screening was supposed to begin, the owner of Magic City Books (Tulsa’s own Shop on The Corner) came in to ask a few Tom Hanks-related trivia questions, until arriving at the final question regarding YGM. I knew this was my moment to prove my ridiculously extensive knowledge of the movie, but also knew it could be a moment of potential humiliation if it happened to be some obscure question about a superfluous detail within the film— “what’s the name of the nut shop included in the introductory montage?” (It’s Broadway Nut Shop, btw). But alas, instead, it was a fairly easy question for anyone who’s seen the movie more than once (Kathleen's favorite book? Pride and Prejudice, of course), so my hand immediately shot up like I was the 6th grade teacher’s pet all over again, I answered the question correctly, and thus walked away with a bookstore gift card and the assurance that I had reached the true peak of my You’ve Got Mail nerd-dom.
I spent the next two hours unable to keep myself from mouthing the words to the entire movie; anyone who’s ever watched it with me becomes thoroughly annoyed very quickly because I’m usually doing more than just mouthing it. The funny thing is, I’ve seen the film so many times that for the last 50 or so, it’s often just background filler while I’m completing household chores and pausing only to act out the scene with the caviar. (“That caviar is a garnish!”) So, it had probably been a long time since I had actually sat down to bask in the true glory of all that it is and watch for details I’d never seen before (few as they may be). You’ve Got Mail was truly the shining star during the golden age of rom-coms— nothing has compared since. A few diamonds in the rough may have appeared in the early 2000s, such as Something’s Gotta Give and The Holiday. But even 25 years later, You’ve Got Mail proves that it has stood the test of time, even with its 1998 IBM laptops, AOL dial-up sounds, and (gasp!) brick-and-mortar bookstores! Someone suggested to me the other day that they should make a modern version of the film with today’s technology. That not only horrifies me due to the fact that I’m firmly against fixing a classic that isn’t broken (we’ll ignore the fact that this was actually a remake itself)— but also because it just wouldn’t be possible. In the days of texting and FaceTime, the movie would be over in 10 minutes.
I do realize that YGM, as with all movies made prior to the #metoo movement, has encountered some backlash in recent years, primarily toward Joe Fox’s character and the almost-creepy-if-you-really-step-back-and-think-about-it way that he “primes” Kathleen Kelly to fall in love with him, all while pretending to be two people at once. I get it. Just let it be an unrealistic rom-com for like a second. And the truth is, as a kid, I never wanted a guy like Joe Fox. I just wanted to be Kathleen Kelly.
I’m also perfectly aware that so much of my admiration for YGM stems from nostalgia, the same nostalgia that creates ardent fans of shows like Stranger Things and the 14 billion Marvel movies. I was ten years old when YGM came out, and this was the movie that ended up defining so much of my perception of art and culture. It made me fall in love with New York, Harry Nilsson, The Cranberries, and daisies, the friendliest flower. I fell in love with Meg Ryan’s timeless, neutral wardrobe: mock necks underneath jumpers with black tights, and the adorable linen J.Crew-type dress she wears in the final scene. I’d still wear every one of those outfits today (her choppy Karen bob… not so much). It inspired me to start sitting on the floor to eat cereal like she does, so the natural morning light can warm my face through the window. It inspired me to visit Cafe Lalo (RIP) in NYC several years ago so I could sit at the very table where the famous “it’s like an entire generation of cocktail waitresses” scene took place. It inspired me to read more. It shaped my passion for the local, the unique, the under-dog, for joining the fight against the status-quo. Essentially, it’s what made me the late 90s version of… what do they call it again? a hipster? (Yes, I know that’s the most shamefully hipster thing I could say.)
More than anything, though, I think YGM was how I fell in love with words. There was plenty of sophisticated humor layered within the film that I didn’t understand as a ten-year-old— literary and Godfather references and off-hand mentions of philosophers (“Heidegger and Foucault…I have no idea what any of it's about, really”) —but all I knew was that I loved it. It’s smart. It’s romantic. The dialogue is perfection, the comedic timing impeccable: a flawless cast, incomparable writing. It’s never too much. The chemistry is palatable. It’s a different level of comedy that isn’t out of reach, and yet isn’t overly dependent on the physical. This isn’t the kind of stuff that wins Academy Awards; rom-coms rarely do. But it was the sugary-sweet yet sharp-witted story that won the heart of every teenage girl that year.
As I left the theater in my haze of post-YGM revelry, I got to thinking about the passing of time and how hard it is to believe that I'm now to the age where anything created in the 90s is vintage and reruns of Friends have now replaced I Love Lucy on Nick at Night (or does that even still exist? I have no earthly idea). And it's even harder to believe that the film that inspired my childhood no longer just exists as a recent rom-com that I like and keep watching over and over. It is now a time machine, transporting me to a world that never changes. Every time I watch it, I want so badly for this time to be the one where the bookstore doesn't have to close, but it always does.
Despite my yearnings, though, I can find comfort in knowing how it's going to end. There are a lot of stories in our lives whose endings we may never know, and definitely not ahead of time. But for the ones we do know, we can take heart. Happy endings do exist– and thankfully, we have movies like You've Got Mail to remind us of them.
