You've Got Mail

On Manhattan's Upper West Side, Kathleen Kelly runs The Shop Around the Corner, an independent children's bookstore she inherited from her mother. Her romantic partner is Frank Navasky, a left-leaning columnist for The New York Observer. While Frank is devoted to his typewriter, Kathleen prefers her laptop and using her AOL email account, under the screen name "Shopgirl", to exchange messages with "NY152", whom she first met in a chatroom. They agreed not to share specifics about their personal lives, though their exchanges are extensive and intimate with Kathleen confiding how much she misses her mother. "NY152" is Joe Fox's screen name. Joe's family runs Fox Books, a major bookstore chain, and he is dating Patricia Eden, an abrasive publisher. Joe is overseeing the opening of a new storefront, just a few blocks from The Shop Around the Corner. Kathleen's three shop assistants—George, Birdie, and Christina—worry the new Fox Books will hurt business, but Kathleen dismisses their concerns. While on an outing with his 11-year-old aunt Annabel and 4-year-old half-brother Matthew, Joe takes them to Kathleen's store for a storytime event. He and Kathleen meet, but when she expresses disdain for the new Fox Books store, he withholds his last name. Later that week, Kathleen learns Joe's true identity when they meet again at a book publishing party. She accuses Joe of deception and spying, while he belittles her store, earning each other's hostility. "Shopgirl" emails "NY152" asking for business advice; he urges she fight back. Frank pens a column supporting The Shop Around the Corner that draws widespread attention, leading to talk show appearances, news coverage, and picketing outside Fox Books. Joe is aggravated by the negative publicity, but his father insists it will blow over once they open. "Shopgirl" and "NY152" arrange to meet at a café. Joe arrives with Kevin, his Fox Books store manager. Kevin peeks through the window and informs Joe that his pen pal is actually his professional nemesis. Joe initially walks away but then joins Kathleen at the table without revealing his online identity. They clash again and Kathleen insults him, invoking her mother, causing Joe to appear very pained and leave. Kathleen believes "NY152" never showed up. Later that night, "Shopgirl" emails "NY152" to say she finally stood up to an unpleasant person but now feels terrible about it. "NY152" apologizes for not being there and assures Kathleen that anything she said to the other person was probably provoked and likely deserved. Despite efforts to save The Shop Around the Corner, business steadily declines, while the new Fox Books thrives. Kathleen closes the store and decides she will write children's books. Later, she and Frank amicably end their relationship, laughing at how perfect they are for one another on paper only. Joe breaks up with Patricia and realizes his feelings for Kathleen. He slowly builds a face-to-face relationship with her whilst continuing their online dialogue, without revealing his dual identity. Eventually, "NY152" arranges another meeting with "Shopgirl". Right before the meetup, Joe sees Kathleen and confesses his feelings, imploring her to forgive his past animosity. Kathleen becomes emotional, hinting she feels the same but cannot forego her connection with "NY152". Upon arriving at the meeting place, Kathleen, hearing a voice calling for Brinkley, "NY152's" dog, realizes it is Joe Fox. She admits she hoped it would be him, and they kiss. ==Cast==

Influences ''You've Got Mail is based on the 1937 Hungarian play Parfumerie by Miklós László and its adaptations. Parfumerie was later remade as The Shop Around the Corner, a 1940 film by Ernst Lubitsch, which in 1949 was adapted as a musical film, In the Good Old Summertime by Robert Z. Leonard starring Judy Garland and Van Johnson and, finally, in 1963 as a Broadway musical with She Loves Me by Jerry Bock and Sheldon Harnick (composer and lyricist, respectively, of Fiddler on the Roof). You've Got Mail'' updates that concept with the use of email, and the lead character's workplace is named "The Shop Around the Corner" as a nod to the 1940 film. Influences from Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice can also be seen in the relationship between Joe Fox and Kathleen Kelly—a reference pointed out by these characters actually discussing Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet in the film. The joke when Tom Hanks explains that the little girl is really his aunt is taken from Israel Zangwill's story "A New Matrimonial Relation" in ''The Bachelors' Club'' (1891). Casting Julia Roberts declined the role of Kathleen Kelly because she lacked confidence in the quality of the romcom scripts of the time. Filming Principal photography took place primarily on New York City's Upper West Side. Principal photography began on February 25, 1998, and completed on June 8, 1998. Delia Ephron, recalling the film's bookstore setting, said, "Once we decided that she would be an independent bookstore owner, the reason we made it a children's bookstore is, I think, we always tried to make movies as personal as we could. To find the thing in it that was personal. And we grew up loving children's books more than anything." The filming location used as the bookstore was at 106 West 69th Street, at that time Maya Shaper's Cheese and Antique Shop. Michael Palin was initially cast as a reclusive novelist based on Thomas Pynchon, but his scenes were cut from the film. Website The film's original website remained live until at least May 10, 2018. The website has proven to be fodder for criticism of web design from the 1990s. ==Soundtrack==

A soundtrack was released on December 1, 1998, featuring a mixture of classics from the 1950s and 1970s, particularly the work of Harry Nilsson, as well as new original recordings and covers. The score to the film was written by English composer George Fenton. ==Reception==

Box office ''You've Got Mail'' grossed $115.8 million in the United States and Canada and $135 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $250.8 million. Critical response On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, ''You've Got Mail'' holds an approval rating of 70% based on 89 reviews, with an average rating of 6.3/10. The website's critics consensus reads, "Great chemistry between the leads made this a warm and charming delight." Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 58 out of 100, based on 19 critics, indicating "mixed or average" reviews. Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film a grade of A− on a scale of A to F. Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film three-out-of-four stars and lauded the "immensely lovable" main characters. Janet Maslin of The New York Times also praised the film, writing of the leads, "Ms. Ryan plays her role blithely and credibly this time, with an air of freshness, a minimum of cute fidgeting and a lot of fond chemistry with Mr. Hanks. And he continues to amaze. Once again, he fully inhabits a new role without any obvious actorly behavior, to the point where comparisons to James Stewart ... really cannot be avoided." Lael Loewenstein of Variety similarly called it a "winning romantic comedy" and praised the chemistry between Hanks and Ryan, writing, "they show why they are two of Hollywood's most bankable and, in many ways, most traditional stars." and Gene Shalit on the Today Show called the film "exciting and enchanting". Nathan Rabin of The A.V. Club disliked the film, and wrote: "Takes almost two self-infatuated, smarmy, condescending, cringe-inducingly sentimental hours to reach its pre-ordained conclusion" and called the film "almost unwatchably saccharine, representing pretty much everything wrong with today's big-budget, high-concept Hollywood filmmaking." Michael O'Sullivan of The Washington Post criticized the film's use of product placement and its overly "adorable" characters, writing, "For some reason, this film made me feel like a Christmas goose being fattened for slaughter. Its force-fed diet of whimsy cloyed long before the eagerly anticipated romantic payoff arrived to put me out of my misery." Maitland McDonagh also criticized the incongruous product placement "In a film about the ruthless corporate destruction of small businesses, it's hard not to flinch at the prominent placement accorded IBM, Starbucks, and AOL logos." Rolling Stone later included ''You've Got Mail'' in their list of "Most Egregious Product Placements in Movie & TV History" for the film's frequent use of AOL trademarks (AOL would later merge with film distributor Warner Bros' parent company Time Warner to form AOL Time Warner in 2000). Accolades == Notes ==