Letters to Juliet

Letters to Juliet is a 2010 American romantic drama film starring Amanda Seyfried, Chris Egan, Vanessa Redgrave, Gael García Bernal, and Franco Nero. This was the final film of director Gary Winick before he died of brain cancer. The film was released theatrically in North America and other countries on May 14, 2010. The idea for the film was inspired by the 2006 non-fiction book, “Letters to Juliet,” by Lise Friedman and Ceil Friedman, which chronicles the phenomenon of letter writing to Shakespeare’s most famous romantic heroine.
Sophie (Amanda Seyfried) is an American young woman who works for The New Yorker and is a fact checker. To put some spark in her life, she decides to go on a ‘pre-honeymoon’ with her chef fiancé Victor (Gael Garcia Bernal) to Verona. However the workaholic Victor is unmoved by the romance of Italy and utilises his time to do research for his soon-to-open restaurant, ignoring Sophie. The lonely Sophie discovers by chance an unanswered “letter to Juliet” by Claire in the 1950’s — one of thousands of missives left at the fictional lover’s Verona courtyard, which are typically answered by the “secretaries of Juliet”. She answers it and soon enough the now elderly Claire (Vanessa Redgrave) arrives in Verona with her handsome barrister grandson Charlie (Christopher Egan), who works for human rights.
Charlie and Sophie take an instant dislike for each other with Charlie behaving very brusque with Sophie while she is very sarcastic with him. On the other hand, Claire is still looking to rediscover her long lost love, Lorenzo Bartolini. Sophie, thinking Claire’s story might help her in her writing career, decides to help her in her quest. What happens next is a story of romantic twists and turns. They look for many Lorenzo Bartollinis. After many days of searching, they find that a Lorenzo Bartolini has been dead. An angry Charlie blames Sophie for his grandmother’s sadness. He yells at her, stating that she does not know what real loss is, which causes an upset Sophie to walk away. Claire, seeing the little dispute, tells Charlie that he was wrong and that Sophie’s mother had walked away from her when she was a little girl. The next day, Claire insists that Charlie apologize to Sophie at breakfast, and he does. After dinner, Sophie goes out with Charlie and talks to him about love, when he accidentally kisses her. The next morning, it is their last day of searching for Claire’s long lost love. On a whim, Claire points out a vineyard to Charlie and asks if he could stop by so the three of them can have a farewell drink for Sophie. As Charlie drives down the road, Claire sees a young man who looks exactly like her Lorenzo. She yells at Charlie to stop, and he complies. They discover that the man is Lorenzo Bartolini’s grandson. Claire and Lorenzo reunite after fifty long years.
Back in New York, Sophie and Victor decide to break up. Sophie returns to Verona to be at Claire and Lorenzo’s wedding. She finds Charlie there with another woman, Patricia, and runs out. Charlie comes to find her (in a classic balcony setting) and she admits she loves him, but tells him to go back to his date. Telling Sophie that the woman was actually his cousin Patricia, not his ex-girlfriend Patricia, he tells her he loves her and wants to be with her. He accidentally falls off the balcony and they kiss as he’s lying on the ground.