Letters To Juliet (2010) **1/2

Letter's To Juliet is another one of those films that come out for the ladies to go to instead of Iron Man 2 or Robin Hood. May has become well known not only for the start of the summer movie season, but the slow, well timed release of films geared toward the segment of the population that doesn't want to see Iron Man, but eagerly anticipate Sex and the City 2. I go back to that glorious summer when Monster-in-Law held the top spot at the box office until Revenge of the Sith was released. It's a way for everyone to have something to see at the movies.

Juliet stars Amanda Seyfried as Sophie, an aspiring writer who travels to Italy with her workaholic cook fiance for a "pre-honeymoon" that soon turns into a buying trip for the fiance. While exploring the city Sophie comes across the wall below the balcony of Juliet and the hundreds of letter left there each day by lonely hearts and the broken hearted. She soon discovers a group of women that answer the letters and becomes enthralled with them, eventually leading her to write to a star crossed lover whose letter was lost behind a brick fifty years before. Claire (Vanessa Redgrave), the writer of the letter, soon arrives on a quest to find her lost love Carlo (Franco Nero) with her pessimistic grand son Charlie (Christopher Egan) in tow.

I was actually surprised by this movie. It wasn't as much of a dud to watch as I had expected. True, the film is cliched as hell with the stereotypical dumped fiance in waiting character that seemed a little too obsessed with work and the negative Charlie who you knew would end up with Sophie in the end. I'm not putting spoiler tags on that because if you can't tell from the trailer then you have not seen any chick flicks in your entire existence. Otherwise it's an average romantic comedy in a sea of mediocre or worse romantic comedies. You can see what's going to happen a mile away, but it's still not a bad movie. The acting is ok, though Redgrave runs circles around the rest of the cast in terms of being a presence. As I said earlier, overall this is a film that doesn't make you cringe while watching it, which is a plus in my book.