Rom-com fans rejoice: the 1998 classic You’ve Got Mail will be streaming on Netflix again next month. Netflix just announced all the titles coming to its catalog, and You’ve Got Mail will be there on April 1. This is a perfect time for fans to revisit the movie and perhaps introduce new viewers to it as well.
You’ve Got Mail was directed and co-written by Nora Ephron, who worked on the script with her sister Delia Ephron. It was based on 1940 romantic comedy film The Shop Around the Corner, which was itself based on the play Parfumerie by Miklós László. Of course, You’ve Got Mail took a lot of creative liberties with this source material, as its story hinges on the invention of the internet and how its early adopters began to use it. It stars Tom hanks and Meg Ryan as two people who meet online and fall in love, never realizing that they are already business rivals in real life.
Ryan plays Kathleen, the owner of an independent children’s bookstore called The Shop Around the Corner. She is a big fan of the internet where she frequents AOL chatrooms, making new friends. She often chats anonymously with another who user, not realizing he is Joe (Hanks), whose family runs a major bookstore chain. The two agree not to exchange any personal details online, though some critical details slip through, allowing them to identify each other later on.
Joe is in the middle of overseeing the opening of a new branch of Fox Books, which is just around the corner from Kathleen’s shop. In real life, they have a few encounters that verge on hostile, while online they console each other and offer advice. As the story goes on, the strength of their feelings for each other is pitted against the circumstances brewing between them.
You’ve Got Mail was a commercial hit and a critical success as well. It has aged well too – at the time of this writing, the movie has an average rating of 6.3 out of 10 on Rotten Tomatoes, with about 70 percent of reviews counted as positive. Of course, the movie’s highly specific placement in time means that it has some unique quirks, but those only seem to make it even more charming to modern viewers. The depiction of the internet in the 1990s is like a time capsule, from the hardware and interface to the social stigma around “online dating.”
You’ve Got Mail will be available to stream on Netflix starting on April 1, 2024. You can also find it to rent or purchase digitally on PVOD stores, or find it on DVD.