starring tom hanks , meg ryan , rosie o'donnell , ross malinger , bill pullman . rated pg . i have nothing against unabashedly romantic films . when done right , with at least slightly evident restraint , they can be engaging , sweeping , appealing . but it's a hell of a shame when someone botches it as badly as nora ephron botched sleepless in seattle , a hollow , boring romance that should appeal only to the most gullible of viewers ; the ones willing to buy into ephron's whiny views of life and romance . tom hanks and meg ryan , two of hollywood's most likeable stars play sam baldwin and annie reed , repectively . baldwin's wife recently died and he moved to seattle with his son , jonah , seeking to get away from the familiar surroundings which remind him of his late spouse . jonah senses tension and calls a talk radio show to tell the world about their problems . sam seems ready to strangle his son for calling the show , but when he gets on the phone he begins pouring his heart out . ephron has him do this so that annie reed ( meg ryan ) can hear it . annie is a happy woman . she is engaged to walter , an allergy-prone working man and seems to be perfectly content . but after hearing sam the widower on the radio show , she becomes convinced that he is her destiny and is willing to risk her engagement for it . five years after this movie hit theaters , hanks , ryan and ephron would team up again in the far better , although still sub-par romantic comedy you've got mail , which is about people who hate each other in real life falling in love on the internet . at least that movie had a sense of spontaneity . here it seems that the first one hundred minutes exist solely to set up for the last five . the fact that sam and annie will finally meet is so excruciatingly obvious that everything else is perfunctory . sleepless in seattle is full of wonderful performers ; from its two leads to supporting stars like bill pullman and rosie o'donnell . but none of them can save the film from being a bore . its characters are dull and empty , its script isn't funny or particularly charming . the script has a fundamental problem : annie gives up , for little reason , her life with walter to pursue " sleepless in seattle , " whom she has never even seen . it's the kind of life decision that real people don't make , and its a major , unforgivable plausibility sacrifice . in essence , this movie's purpose is to head towards a goal that shouldn't even exist . it's a ten minute short film with ninety-five minutes of filler . if you were to show me sleepless in seattle and i didn't have to review it , you could just call me " asleep in philadelphia . " ©1999 eugene novikov&#137 ; sent via deja . com <a href= " http : //www . deja . com/ " >http : //www . deja . com/</a> share what you know . learn what you don't . 
