You've Got Mail [1998] : We Witnessed The Born of New Days
Last night, I rewatched an old film titled You've Got Mail, which was released a week before Christmas 1998. Distributed by Warner Bros., the film stars Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan. For fans of romantic and slightly dramatic genres, these two names are a guarantee of an interesting watch.
I have watched this film many times. It is one of those films that I will watch again when I have the chance. Among the other films that I am always willing to rewatch are The Godfather trilogy, Tears of The Sun (2003), Hotel Rwanda (2004), Schindler's List (1993), Notting Hill (1999), PK (Hindi, 2014), 3 Idiots (Hindi, 2009), Bangistan (Hindi, 2015) and many other films in those genres, including some superhero films (especially the Batman films directed by Christopher Nolan from 2005 to 2012 (Nolan's Dark Knight trilogy)).
Some people may see You've Got Mail as just another romantic film in which two people search for and find love amid the turmoil of everyday life, an exciting adventure that everyone might experience. In my opinion, the main strength of You've Got Mail is that it captures an important early chapter in the history of the internet, particularly its ability to bridge communication between individuals in new ways.
The film tells the story of Joe Fox (Hanks) and Kathleen Kelly (Ryan) who meet in cyberspace through the America Online (AOL) chat application. At that time, this social application still had very limited capabilities and could only transmit text, so there were no photos accompanying social media accounts as we know them today, such as on Facebook and so on. This reality makes the story even more intriguing because in the real world, the two are rivals. Fox is a wealthy businessman who owns a large chain of bookstores and wants to expand his business into a commercial district in Manhattan, New York, where Kelly runs a bookstore she has no intention of giving up. Kelly has no chance if she truly wants to take on a business giant like Fox. Rivalry in the real world and romance in the anonymous online world.
This film has a history dating back to the 1930s, inspired by a Hungarian play titled Parfumerie, written by Miklós László and first introduced in 1937. Previously, Parfumerie had been adapted into a film titled The Shop Around the Corner in 1940 and in 1949 into a film titled In the Good Old Summertime. I have never watched the two previous adaptations, but I think You've Got Mail is more suitable for my generation because it also serves as a reminder and a flashback to a pivotal point in the development of network communication technology that we witnessed and experienced, either directly or indirectly.
I have never used America Online's chat technology, but I have a pretty good idea of how it works because in the early 2000s I used similar technology from Microsoft, namely mIRC (Microsoft Internet Relay Chatting). Within the mIRC web application, users can register a nickname and participate in real-time conversations in chat rooms around the world, and they can also send private messages to other users. Has anyone of you ever used these applications or something similar in the late 1990s and early 2000s? Maybe KVIrc which seems to still be available these days? KVIrc uses the same tecchnology mIRC did.
For fans of these two actors, apart from You've Got Mail, they will certainly also appreciate their collaboration five years earlier in a film distributed by TriStar Pictures titled Sleepless in Seattle, which was also directed by Nora Ephron, who, in addition to being a filmmaker, is also a journalist.
In terms of technology, today's world is becoming increasingly interconnected, easily accessible through computer screens and other communication devices. Some people are eager to expose themselves, sometimes to the point where they no longer respect their own privacy, and often disturb others, whether intentionally or not, by failing to respect their privacy as well. Many technology users also fall victim to criminals who exploit technology to take advantage of their victims' weaknesses and lapses in caution. Like a knife, its use can serve different purposes depending on whether it is in the hands of a chef or a murderer—the same applies to technology. One must always be on guard to avoid becoming victims.
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SteemVerse, Aug 7th 2025
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