Letters to Juliet (Movie Review)

I had the opportunity to see an advanced screening of Letters to Juliet today with my 2 daughters.  We had received free passes through gofobo.com - (If you haven't signed up for this - you should - and it's free!)

Watch the trailer for Letters to Juliet.

Sophie (Amanda Seyfried) is a fact checker for The New Yorker magazine while her fiance Victor (Gael Garcia Bernal) is busy getting ready to open his new restaurant.  They decide to take a pre-honeymoon to Verona, though I suspect that Victor was planning this trip to only check out suppliers/wines and was not really considering Sophie's wants at all.

While there, Sophie visits Juliet's House, where there is a wall that women leave letters in to ask questions of Juliet - usually concerning the men in their lives.  These letters are all answered by Juliet's "secretaries". Sophie stumbles upon a hidden letter that was written in 1957 from a woman named Claire (Vanessa Redgrave) asking if she did the right thing by not meeting her Lorenzo and running off with him.  She is allowed to answer the letter as one of Juliet's secretaries. 

Within a week, while Sophie is still waiting in Verona for Victor to return from his latest wine auction, Claire's grandson Charlie (Christopher Egan) tracks her down and basically calls her crazy for putting all these thoughts in his grandmother's head about finding this love of her life from 50 years before.  What entails is a trek through the Tuscany countryside looking for Lorenzo. 

Amanda Seyfriend was wonderful as Sophie - she is just such a likeable actress.  (I also enjoyed her in Dear John).  She is like the girl next door - just doesn't seem like there would be a mean bone in her body.  Christopher Egan as Charlie was hilarious.  He was such a sourpuss in the beginning - never missing a chance to get a jibe in at Sophie - and she pretty much met him barb for barb.  Even though he wanted to come off all - as he put it - as a "realist"  - His comments to Sophie at times were exasperating, but you could see in his eyes that he was interested in her and wanted to believe as she did in the idea that his Gran might actually find her Lorenzo.  They played very well off of each  other.

Vanessa Redgrave was excellent as Clare.  She was so loving and so full of hope - but this was no naive young girl.  She kept her eyes and ears open as to what was happening between Sophie and her grandson.  I loved the way that she didn't take any of Charlie's "crap" but was also so full of love for him.

If you are a romantic - then this is one movie that you don't want to miss.  We enjoyed it greatly.