If you thought the last two Jennifer Aniston pictures were sappy, just wait until you get a load of Letters to Juliet, a confection that’s so treacle-sweet it ought to come with a health warning for diabetics. The increasingly insufferable Amanda Seyfried – a woman who has previously been acted off the screen by Megan Fox(!) – simpers her way through this Italian travelogue, as a New Yorker magazine researcher who finds a 50-year-old love letter and tracks down its author, an elderly romantic played by Vanessa Redgrave.
As our heroine’s fiancé (a wickedly funny Gael Garcia Bernal) gets stuck into local wines and cheeses for his new restaurant venture, Ms. Seyfried finds herself tagging along with her new older chum and the latter’s stuck up, albeit dishy grandson (Chris Egan). Could this Mr. Darcy ersatz win the girl’s hand? Well, d’uh. Striking the same girly tone as How to Make an American Quilt or The Prince and Me, the film’s unmerciful sentimentality is unlikely to suit car chase fans. The twist on the generic formula – British snob may be a more passionate soul than Latin lover – may not sit well with the picture’s natural constituency.
Still, if you have to get dragged to the cinema by the rom-dram or rom-com junkie in your life, it beats the hell out of Sex And The City 2: Attack Of The Camel Women, as that film’s distributor isn’t calling it.