OxfordPress.com

Grade: B-

Verdict: New York looks just like its old self in this fine whimsical romance.

Details: Starring John Cusack and Kate Beckinsale. Directed by Peter Chelsom. PG-13 for a scene of sexuality, and for brief language. One hour, 20 minutes.

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Review: A movie star who's seen some hard times recently makes a dazzling come-back in "Serendipity."

That "star" is New York City, which looks just as it used to - beguiling,romantic and full of possibilities.

It's Christmas in Manhattan. In the midst of the frantic last-minute crush at Bloomingdale's, Jon (John Cusack) and Sara (Kate Beckinsale) reach for the same last pair of cashmere gloves. Each wants them for their significant other. They barter. They banter. They spend a magical few hours together in a city aglow with holiday good cheer. Naturally, Jon asks for her number. But Sara demurs. Their first meeting was so serendipitous that she wants to leave it up to fate as to whether or not they belong together. So she writes her name and phone number in a copy of "Love in the Time of Cholera," which she'll sell to a used book store, and he writes his name and number on a five dollar bill . If he comes across her book or she finds his bill, then destiny is trying to tell them something.

Cut to ten years later. Sara is engaged to Lars (John Corbett),a somewhat silly but very successful New Age musician. Jon is three days away from marrying Halley (Bridget Moynihan) who's bright, beautiful and loving. Neither Sara nor Jon is exactly unhappy but these little signs keep showing up. She finds herself surrounded by posters for his favorite film, "Cool Hand Luke." He keeps hearing the name "Sara" everywhere he goes. With the help of the requisite my-life-means-nothing-compared-to-yours loyal friends (Molly Shannon for Beckinsale, Jeremy Piven for Cusack), they both decide to give Fate one more chance and start actively looking for each other (Cusack also gets a hand from Eugene Levy as an officious Bloomie's salesman.)

What ensues is a series of near misses and close calls which you'll either find delightful or irritating, depending on your tolerance for whimsical romance. Mine's pretty high.

"Serendipity" is directed by Peter Chelsom, who's made one brilliant movie - the cult classic, "Funny Bones" - a couple of so-so's and one outright disaster ("Town and Country.") In "Seredipity," we see several aspects of his up-and-down career. The early scenes are buoyant and lyrical, thanks as much to the shop windows and snowflakes as to the two leads who play love-at-first-sight perfectly. Then, once we get used to the idea that love with the proper stranger may mean more to them than their respective fiancees, the movie sags some. Chelsom teases us a time or two too many with the almost-but-not-quite stuff. And frankly, while we don't mind seeing Lars discarded, there doesn't seem to be anything wrong with Halley. Jon's readiness to dump her doesn't sit right. Especially in a movie as in love with love as this one is.

On the whole, however, "Serendipity" is more pixilated than anything else. And -- this is a tricky thing -- having the movie take place in New York after so much tragedy may strike some as heartless, myopic, even tasteless. Certainly giving Piven a job as an obits writer at the New York Times is an unfortunate who-knew? coincidence that can't be edited out (as were shots of the World Trade Center.)

But there's something kind of courageous here, too. "Serendipity" celebrates a city that has refused to knuckle under. A movie like this reminds us what New York was and what it will be again. And in a time when there have been so many unhappy twists of fate, it's nice to see a film that calls itself "Serendipity," as in, a happy twist of fate.

— Eleanor Ringel Gillespie, (none)