Alternative Film Guide

Sleepless in Seattle (1993)

Director: Nora Ephron. Screenplay: Nora Ephron, David S. Ward, Jeff Arch, and Delia Ephron (uncredited), from an original story by Jeff Arch. Cast: Tom Hanks, Meg Ryan, Bill Pullman, Ross Malinger, Rosie O’Donnell

MEN ARE FROM SEATTLE, WOMEN ARE FROM BALTIMORE

In Krzysztof Kieslowski’s Rouge / Red, the last installment of his "Three Colors" trilogy, the word "magic" is never uttered. No need to. Magic is everywhere in that lyrical tale about love and fate. In Nora Ephron’s Sleepless in Seattle, which received an Academy Award nomination for best original screenplay, the word "magic" seems to crop up every other minute. Ephron and fellow screenwriters Jeff Arch, David S. Ward, and (an uncredited) Delia Ephron were apparently trying to create screen magic through self-hypnosis. If you say it often enough. . . .

Following in the steps of Claude Lelouch’s 1974 Toute une vie / And Now My Love, with added touches of Leo McCarey’s 1957 romance classic An Affair to Remember (itself a remake of McCarey’s own 1939 Love Affair), co-scenarist-director Nora Ephron’s box-office smash Sleepless in Seattle is a tale of romantic yearning in which real feelings and emotions are replaced by mannered cutesiness and near-lethal doses of saccharine.

Nora Ephron has written numerous hard-hitting essays; one good screenplay about a strong woman, Silkwood; and a damning indictment of former husband Carl Bernstein, Heartburn, a novel that in 1986 was turned into a movie starring Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep. Apparently, however, hidden under Ephron’s tough-as-nails surface was a sentimentalist screaming to get out.

Inspired by An Affair to Remember, Ephron and her fellow co-writers have our hero (code name: Sleepless in Seattle) and heroine (just plain Annie, of Baltimore) brought together by fate — propelled by your typical know-it-all movie brat — at the top of the Empire State Building. In An Affair to Remember, the meeting never takes place — a car interferes with Deborah Kerr’s dash to "the closest place to heaven on Earth." At the climax of Sleepless in Seattle, this reviewer ardently hoped for a meteor hit that would send Annie directly to heaven itself, but realistically speaking, no one in their right mind could believe from the get-go that anything would prevent Baltimore’s Annie from having a tête à tête with Seattle’s Sleepless.

What saves Sleepless in Seattle from total disaster is the sheer likableness of its two leads, Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan. Neither performer brings much depth to their characterizations — Ryan, in particular, suffers because Annie is such an underwritten role — but both of them have that indefinable quality that turns mere actors into movie stars. (Admittedly, my idea of "movie star" may not be yours; and vice versa.) Hanks, who had been worried during production that his "sensitive," grieving widower would come across as a wimp, has the advantage of getting (or creating, since the actor also ad-libbed) some of the best sardonic lines in the film.

On the downside, the supporting players, generally a welcome relief from the overall mawkishness of movie romances, do not offer much help in this one. Bill Pullman, as the other man, Walter, overdoes his I’m-allergic-to-anything-and-everything bit. After a couple of minutes, I was the one sneezing and gasping for air each time Walter showed up on-screen. Future talk-show hostess Rosie O’Donnell is no more than adequate as a drier, more staid Una Merkel type, but I must give O’Donnell credit for the best line delivery in the film. "I love that dream," she matter-of-factly tells Annie — referring to those dreams in which the dreamer finds herself walking naked in public places.

Watching Sleepless in Seattle, we learn that men and women have different sensibilities (women cry while watching An Affair to Remember; men don’t cry, period); that an inarticulate, faux-emotional chat on a call-in radio program may lead to unexpected romance with a cute blonde from Baltimore; and that a person can experience magical & ever-lasting romantic love more than once. Thus, when Sleepless and Annie go meet their maker at the top of heaven’s equivalent to the Empire State Building, I expect them to be joined by Sleepless’ first wife in eternal three-way bliss. Now, that is a movie I’d like to see.

Synopsis:

Architect Sam Baldwin (Tom Hanks) is a young widower and the father of 8-year-old Jonah (Ross Malinger). Sam moves from Chicago to Seattle to forget his recently deceased wife, but she still shows up in his daydreams. Worried about his father, Jonah contacts a call-in radio program. Egged on by Jonah, Sam ends up discussing his feelings of loss and loneliness on national radio.

At the other end of the United States, in Baltimore, Annie Reed (Meg Ryan) is on her way to meet her fiancé, Walter (Bill Pullman), when she accidentally tunes into that radio station. Annie — along with thousands of other women across the U.S. — fall in love with Sam’s voice and with his longing for "magic." A few days later, her best friend, Becky (Rosie O’Donnell), mails a letter Annie had written to Sam. When Jonah reads Annie’s letter, he decides that Annie will be his next mom. The problem is that Sam has been dating another woman, Victoria (Barbara Garrick), whose hyena laughter drives Jonah insane.

But when Jonah runs away to New York to meet with Annie at the top of the Empire State Building, Sam goes after the boy — and toward his true love.

DVD:

There are several different versions of the Sleepless in Seattle Region 1 DVD (U.S. / Canada / U.S. territories).

The most important extra is the audio commentary by director-coscreenwriter Nora Ephron and her sister Delia, who also cowrote the film. The two were clearly recorded separately, but it is a good combination of opinions and information. In fact, especially in the case of Nora (who, as the film’s director, also gets more audio time than Delia), the commentary we hear is enlightening and much more enjoyable than anything that goes on in the movie proper. Highly recommended.

List price: US$19.94.

A Columbia / Tri-Star release.

Notes:

In the DVD commentary, Delia Ephron (Nora’s sister) explains that she was brought into the project for rewrites, since Tom Hanks and the producers were not too happy with the script. Delia didn’t receive screen credit for her contributions to the screenplay, but she was credited as an "Associate Producer."

Caroline Aaron provides the voice of Dr. Marcia Fieldstone.

Parker Posey’s scenes were deleted from the final release print.

Nora Ephron helped Meg Ryan understand the character of Annie Reed by explaining that Annie should be played as "a Republican who had never had an orgasm." Ryan, however, comes across as anything but a frigid Republican.

MIVTSA YONATAN / OPERATION THUNDERBOLT

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THE INSIDER

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THE DOOR IN THE FLOOR

THE LETTER (1940)

LORD JIM (1925)

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