Adorably Cute 'Mail' By Rita Kempley Washington Post Staff Writer Friday, December 18, 1998

'Net gain: Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan woo each other through e-mail in "You've Got Mail." (Warner Bros.) Director: Nora Ephron Cast: Tom Hanks; Meg Ryan; Hallee Hirsh; Dabney Coleman; David Chappelle; Greg Kinnear; Michael Palin; Parker Posey; Jean Stapleton; Steve Zahn Running Time: 1 hour, 56 minutes For language

Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks type their little hearts out in director Nora Ephron's easy, breezy and aggressively adorable comic romance. Based upon 1940's "The Shop Around the Corner," the movie updates that tale of anonymous pen pals by moving the correspondence from the mailbox to modem.

Joe Fox (Hanks) and Kathleen Kelly (Ryan), a pair of Upper West Siders, travel in the same circles, work in the same industry, even buy their skim latte grandes from the same Starbucks. They've also been sharing nakedly honest, increasingly affectionate e-mail as NY152 and Shopgirl. Yet they've never laid eyes on each other.

When they do eventually meet, they know each other only as bitter business rivals. Joe, the savvy heir to a chain of Borders-like emporiums, has just opened a branch in the neighborhood that has long been the home of Kathleen's children's bookstore.

With its deep discounts, huge inventory, comfy sofas and coffee bar, Fox Books seems certain to put Kathleen's quaint, cozy, child-friendly Shop Around the Corner right out of business. As she begins to lose money and her clientele, Shopgirl appeals to NY152, who urges her to go to war with the competition.

Though the pair are clearly meant for one another, the inevitable denouement is complicated not only by their intial enmity, but also their relationships with a shrill book editor (Parker Posey) and a smug newspaper columnist (Greg Kinnear). Kathleen and Joe make up the main dish, but these two are just the parsley on the plate. Like Jean Stapleton, Dave Chappelle and Dabney Coleman, who also have supporting roles, the off-leads are poorly served by these underwritten and largely insignificant parts.

Ephron, who wrote the adaptation with her sister Delia, makes barbed observations about the Gapification of America and the latte and laptop culture, waxes riotous on men's obsession with the "Godfather" movies and generally abides by the time-honored boy-gets-girl formula.

Alas, there is really no graceful or honorable way to end the story once Joe learns that Kathleen is his cyber-soulmate and continues to keep his silence. In his reluctance to ruin the relationship, he becomes a sneak and a liar. And the Ephron sisters seem to have concluded that it's fine to be taken in by a rapacious businessman as long as he's really funny and cute.

Despite all the lip service paid to the battle of the bookstores, the Little Shop's fate always seems as inescapable as Starbucks. Funny the coffeehouse conglomerate should be so prominently featured, considering the movie's seeming contempt for mega-chains and for yuppies who equate coffee with culture. (It's probably futile to point out that Starbucks was once a small business in Seattle. That's why they're sleepless there.)

"You've Got Mail" is primarily an attempt to cash in on the potent chemistry between Hanks and Ryan, who radiate warmth like a couple of space heaters. Maybe Hanks represents corporate greed, but he's no Gordon Gekko. He comes off as a benign businessman who just wants to make books more affordable to more readers.

And Ryan's Kathleen is hardly an independent woman of the '90s. She's not a woman at all. Dressed in cuddly-wuddly wittle jammies and woolly socks on more than one occasion, she's downright infantile. Perhaps getting out of the children's book business would be a good thing for this poor woman after all.

Though it turns on timely issues and lobs zingers at trendy poseurs, "You've Got Mail" is as old-fashioned as snail mail. But, in these unsteady times, it is a welcome delivery.