When Harry Met Sally (Wide Screen) > Reviews > I'll have what she's having

Author's product rating:   

Did you enjoy it?	Loved it
Story	Good
Characters / Performances	Outstanding
Special Effects	Standard
How does it compare to similar films?	Good

Advantages:	witty, well acted, feelgood
Disadvantages:	none for me

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

When Harry Met Sally was THE comedy of 1989. Everyone was talking about it. Starring Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal – both of whom were HUGE at the time - it asked the question, ‘Can two friends sleep together and still remain friends in the morning'?

Directed by Rob Reiner and scripted by Nora Ephron, the film starts with a real-life old couple talking about their romance. Then it jumps back to a time when Crystal (Harry) and Ryan (Sally) were university graduates sharing a car on a trip to Chicago. They don’t get on and both are glad when the trip is over.

Move forward five years and they meet again, on a plane. They’re still chalk and cheese, but this time their dynamic is different. They talk about their relationships and leave the plane as friends.

Move forward several years again. Harry and Sally are both newly single. They start to spend time together. Just friends at first, but Harry keeps on pushing until eventually they get it on. Next morning she’s in love and he’s off like the clappers. Ouch. Will they or won’t they reunite, as either lovers or friends?

WHMS is an old-fashioned romantic comedy and the script takes its inspiration from classics of old like Some Like it Hot or The Philadelphia Story, films where the script was witty, classy and sharp. The exchanges and disagreements between Crystal and Ryan are pure Hollywood golden age, though contemporary in language and subject matter.

Along the way we meet other relationshipees, such as Carrie Fisher’s fine portrayal of a woman eternally trapped in the eternal triangle with a married man. (Friends: ‘He’ll never leave her’. Fisher: ‘You’re right, you’re right. I know you’re right’. A scene repeated over and over throughout the years).

Crystal and Ryan are both excellent in this film and have a genuine chemistry. Both have superb timing and play off each other very well. Harry is wise-cracking and cynical. Ryan is the perfect foil as the unashamedly optimistic romantic girlie. It’s a relationship that works because it causes sparks and misunderstandings.

The film has loads of spoken comic gems, mostly from Harry, none of which I’ll give away. It also has Ryan and Crystal’s facial expressions, which always sum up what they’re feeling.

And then there’s the famous restaurant fake orgasm scene, a now oft-imitated cinema classic.

The film works so well because though it makes you laugh, and it makes you laugh a lot, it deals with the universal human search for love and the man/woman conflicts we face every day of our lives. We laugh with Harry and Sally rather than at them. We recognise ourselves and our own relationships in them and theirs.

WHMS isn’t a great film but it is very, very good. It sparked a string of imitators (such as Sleepless in Seattle, also scripted by Ephron but not nearly as sharp), and caused much conversation in pubs and on TV talk shows.

Ephron was nominated for an Oscar for original screenplay but alas didn’t win. No other awards were offered, but the public flocked to the film in droves.

So what about Crystal’s declaration and the film’s premise, “Men and women can't be friends because the sex part always gets in the way”?

Well, the film never really answers the question, but who cares? Buy the video, get some popcorn, crack open a beer and enjoy the wittiest thing to come out of the ‘80s.