When Harry Met Sally

Nora Ephron wrote the first and wrote and directed the second, four years apart, and the second is where her method hardened into the form the decade then copied. What carries over: a couple kept apart by structure rather than by misunderstanding, documentary-style interludes of other people talking about love, a best friend who exists to be argued with, and an ending staged at a landmark on a date. Sleepless in Seattle then does the harder thing and keeps its leads apart for almost the whole film, which only works because When Harry Met Sally had established that an Ephron audience will wait. Filed MEDIUM: one writer developing her own method.

The film uses Casablanca as its running argument about love. On their first drive Harry and Sally fight over whether Ilsa was right to get on the plane, and years later they watch the ending together over the phone from separate apartments. It is a reference the characters make, and the question it poses, whether you settle for the sensible choice, is the film's own.