SERENDIPITY

Every romantic comedy (exceptions anyone?) has a very similar basic structure:

Couple meets. Couple separates. Couple re-unites.

Often the couple meets cute; in any case, this part is usually fun. Couple re-unites is, also, usually fun, although at least since The Graduate, there is too often some kind of mad dash someone makes at the end, frequently to an airport, sometimes to a wedding, perhaps running or dashing in a car or stuck in traffic.

The hard part is getting them to separate in just the right way.

Serendipity separates them in just the wrong way. She (Kate Beckinsale) believes in "fate" to the extent that she contrives a "game" that results in keeping her apart from him (John Cusack) for years, until finally, later, at the point of committing to others, they decide to search for each other.

The tag line, according to imdb is "Trust in fate...it will take you where it wants to." In fact, the story is just the opposite. The actual moral of the story is: Do not trust in fate -- it will take you to the wrong place; you've got to do it yourself. (See the joke Will's son tells in The Pursuit of Happyness.)

It's a pretty lame movie, with few joyful (or sexy) moments, but it does have the following redeeming qualities:

• Kate Beckinsale is very beautiful.
• John Cusack is an appealing love interest.
• Serendipity (the ice cream / clothing store on 60th street in NY) would be a nice place to visit again, and this commercial (er... movie) is a great reminder.
• It's a romantic comedy (and how terrible can it be to spend a couple hours watching romance, after all).