Given that last time I spoke about paths crossing and intertwining, I thought to continue with the same theme for this month’s movie. When Harry met Sally is a 1989 movie starring Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan. The plot is about a chance encounter, a story of two lives interlacing and eventually sharing the same path.
The movie has close to no real action, nor does it need to; the scenes only feature the main protagonists and the points in time they meet, talk and spend time together. It is only partially a game of “will they, won’t they” but even that is secondary to the narrative. At its core, through well-written dialogue, the movie succeeds in being captivating and hilarious. I notice that I have not much to add about it and that because even if I could try to explain why the movie is as good as it is, I would somehow fail it. It is much more that a story of two characters and their lives, it is a story that could happen to anyone; the beauty of lives intersecting, each with their personal dimensions and inner problems, perceptions, moments of happiness or of sadness. It is life, and the is final.
A further consideration to be made is about love in life and the fact that it requires what may be called “the right moment” or the “appropriate occasion”. Well, here’s the fact, one that When Harry met Sally somewhat portrays: it is both never the right moment and it is always the right moment. It may be a question of decisiveness or one of stalling for a timely approach, one that involves a stalemate or a profound desire to give yourself to someone else. I would not say that the moral should be to “just do it” and take any opportunity you get, but at the very least, the leitmotif is to be aware of what waiting entails.
One last note, it has one of the best split-screen four-way whimsically-fast-paced telephone conversations of all time.
I would give this movie a good 7 out of 10 perfectly written scripts.