DtheRH | When Harry Met Sally

Rating:

Lillian
Llywellyn

When Harry Met Sally
USA, 1989
[Rob Reiner]
Billy Crystal, Meg Ryan, Carrie Fisher, Bruno Kirby
Romance / Comedy

I love �chick-flicks�. Did I ever tell you that? Well, in my humble opinion, this one takes the biscuit. It tells the story of Harry Burns, excellently portrayed by the sublime Billy Crystal, and his 12-year romance with Sally Albright, ably played by Meg Ryan. They first meet outside the University of Chicago after graduation and as they were both going to New York to start their professional careers, to save money they spend the next 36-odd hours on a road trip to their new lives.

Billy Crystal is the smart-ass guy whose glass is PERMANENTLY half empty summed up in the quote �If I read a book I always read the last page first, that way if I die in the middle of it�I know how it ends�. You can see where I�m going with this. Ryan on the other hand is perpetually optimistic. She knows she�s going to get a job, land a husband and knock out a few kids. In that order.

After stopping off at a diner, the sparks really start to fly with this mis-matched pair. Sally is so anally retentive, (it takes her eons to order apple pie) that Harry, who is boorish and proud of it, makes a pass at her. Sally is appalled at this as Harry previously dated her best friend. Harry tries to take it back, but Sally says that it�s impossible. This starts the beginning of their strange friendship. They get to New York and after a very strained handshake, they go their separate ways.

We fast-forward five years and here is where the film is spoiled by the couple�s monologues between scenes. They didn�t seem significant to me, maybe others will disagree, but I always reach for the �scan forward� button on my remote control whenever the couples are on, but anyhoo, I digress.

Five years later and Harry is a lawyer, Sally is a journalist and they meet again in an airport as Sally is kissing her boyfriend Joe (who just happens to live in the same block of flats as Harry). Harry recognises Sally on the plane and they get talking. They discuss their private lives and Sally is astounded to discover that Harry is getting married. She can�t believe that the neanderthal she met five years previously could manage to get anyone to marry him. Once again they go their separate ways and for me its remote controller time.

Fast forward another five years and we find our heroine having lunch with her girlfriends. She tells them she�s broken up with Joe and how men are off the menu for her. At the same time we find Harry talking to his best friend Jesse (played by Bruno Kirby) discussing his divorce from his wife after he discovered she�d been cheating on him. Sally and her best friend Marie (wonderfully portrayed by Carrie Fisher) are spied on in a bookshop by Harry. Marie, ever the matchmaker, makes a discreet exit as Harry and Sally meet up again. They start talking about the last ten years and slowly become friends. After a disastrous (for them at least) best-friends double date they discover that ironically its Marie and Jesse who get on like a house on fire! Oh dear God� where�s the remote?

Their friendship grows stronger over the next few months and here�s where the infamous fake orgasm scene comes into being (pardon the pun), until matters step in when Sally gets the earth-shattering news that her ex-boyfriend is getting married. Distraught, she calls Harry and seduces him. They cant face each other the next day and their friendship starts to crumble, culminating in a fight at Marie and Jesse�s wedding. As midnight on New Years Eve approaches Harry realises that he�s fallen in love with Sally and Sally feels the same. They make up and the rest (to me at least is a blur cos I�m normally crying my eyes out at this point) is history.
This is a very good film, one of my favourites in fact, but as I�ve already said is majorly spoiled by the inane dronings of the intermissions.