Romantic comedy Serendipity takes its title from two sources. One is the quality that word embodies: “It’s a nice sound for what it means, a fortunate accident,” says Sara Thomas, played by a luminous but determined Kate Beckinsale. The other is a real-life Manhattan dessert shop, which puts this movie in the same class as other New York films based on actual locations, like Coyote Ugly.
The sweets shop reference is appropriate, since the movie is the cinematic equivalent of a plate made of spun sugar. The director Peter Chelsom’s touch shines with a kind of craftsmanship, but it’s sticky to the touch; if you look hard enough, you can see the sugar granules gleaming just beneath the surface.
”Serendipity” sets John Cusack loose on the kind of character he was born to play, the all-American guy’s guy who is more sensitive than his bruiser’s frame might suggest. Mr. Cusack rarely portrays men with commitment problems; in his last two movies, ”America’s Sweethearts” and ”High Fidelity,” he was the dude wearing the remains of his heart on his sleeve, a wreck from rejection by the love of his life. His Jonathan Trager, like many Cusack characters, is someone who can’t stop going on about what he’s feeling, and Marc Klein’s script allows him to go on and on in the vein that this actor mines best.
Jonathan, known as Jon, and Sara meet at Bloomingdale’s while Christmas shopping and then end up on a dream date that includes gliding around Wollman Rink in Central Park and sharing a dessert at Serendipity. ”You should give me your phone number, just in case,” Jon asserts. ”In case of what?” Sara burbles coyly. ”In case of life,” the fast-talking Jon responds.
Because they’re both involved with other people, Sara has qualms about exchanging information with him. Instead, she writes her phone number in a copy of ”Love in the Time of Cholera,” which she hands off to a used-book seller, and makes Jon put his digits on a $5 bill, which she spends. If these objects come back into their lives, she contends, then they’re destined to be together. This gambit inflates passive-aggressive behavior to such epic proportions that it would take even Oprah a week to work it out.
The movie then shifts to ”a few years later,” when Jon is engaged to Halley (Bridget Moynahan) and Sara to Lars (John Corbett), a jocular New Age musician and Yanni-be. Just before their impending marriages, the old feelings overwhelm Jon and Sara. So they set off individually to find the clues that will lead them to each other.
The problem with romantic comedies involving triangles or, in the case of ”Serendipity,’ quadrangles, is that the potential mates of the leads have to be attractive yet no real competition. Lars is simply comic relief; despite his hippie’s attenuated timing, Mr. Corbett isn’t even the breath-of-fresh-air alternative he is on ”Sex and the City.” (When he proposes to Sara, he outfits their place with rows of burning candles and scattered flower petals that make their San Francisco house look like a window at Pottery Barn.) Mr. Corbett is luckier than poor Ms. Moynahan, whose Halley doesn’t even rate a personality.
”Serendipity” tries to marry the screwball comedy to the what-if genre created by Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan in ”Sleepless in Seattle,” in which the two leads spend most of the movie just missing each other, either metaphorically or literally. The film carries some of the same standard equipment found in screwball comedies, like those expendable mates, as well as the wisecracking best friends of the leads and a Franklin Pangborn-type character, an officious and self-serving Bloomie’s clerk played with knife-sharp timing by Eugene Levy.
The real love-story shine in ”Serendipity” comes in the work between Mr. Cusack and Jeremy Piven, who plays Jon’s best friend, Dean. (Mr. Cusack and Mr. Piven have been colleagues and friends for years.) With his ruminative sighs and expressive pauses, Mr. Cusack has a knack for making his lines sound offhand, like found objects, as if he were inventing them on the spot; writers must love him. And the conversational rhythms between Jon and Dean are honest and lifelike.
Mr. Chelsom’s bent for floating modern mysticism, which surfaced in ”Hear My Song,” doesn’t quite jell here. His hand is a little forced, so when the coincidences that send the movie careering toward its inexorable climax come, you shrug them off. Some, like a wallet mix-up, seem altogether miscalculated, since the mistake would involve Sara’s boarding a plane with her best friend’s ID.
It’s also a little unfortunate that Dean is an obituary writer for this newspaper, which has been magically transported from West 43rd to West 42nd Street for reasons that only Fate, which keeps Jon and Sara apart, knows. ”Serendipity” asks us to believe that Fate’s will is influenced by old movies and a few seasons’ worth of ”Mad About You.” Don’t the gods have better things to do? Or at least have more cable channels than mere mortals?
Serendipity (2001)
Directed by: Peter Chelsom
Starring: Kate Beckinsale, John Cusack, Gary Gerbrandt, Kate Blumberg, Bridget Moynahan, Lilli Lavine, Ann Talman, Crystal Bock, Gary Gerbrandt, Abdul Alshawish
Screenplay by: Marc Klein
Cinematography by: John De Borman
Film Editing by: Christopher Greenbury
Costume Design by: Marie-Sylvie Deveau
Set Decoration by: Catherine Davis, Carol Lavoie
Art Direction by: Tracey Gallacher, Andrew M. Stearn
Makeup Department: Margot Boccia, Victor DeNicola, Janice Miller
Music by: Alan Silvestri
MPAA Rating: PG-13 for a scene of sexuality, and for brief language.
Distributed by: Miramax Films
Release Date: October 5, 2001
Views: 260
