LETTERS TO JULIET (PG)

BUT soft, what light through yonder window breaks?

It is the flickering of Gary Winick’s winsome romantic comedy about one young woman’s quest for everlasting love in sun-dappled Verona, the setting for Shakespeare's Romeo And Juliet.

Screenwriters Jose Rivera and Tim Sullivan serve up a steaming spaghetti of cliches, cultural stereotypes and unintentional laughs, garnished with a light classical and pop soundtrack.

The target audience – teenage girls who swoon at the prospect of a holiday romance – will choke on the clumsy dialogue and the tepid screen chemistry between Amanda Seyfried and Australian actor Christopher Egan as a bumbling Brit abroad.

Director Winick shoots his film as a valentine to the lush, rolling landscapes of Italy – but continuity errors occasionally distract from the scenery.

Letters To Juliet is undone by Egan’s grating performance, trying to convince Sophie and us that ‘I’m not the buttoned-up, buttock-clenching killjoy you make me out to be’.

It’s a pity because Seyfried lights up the screen and Redgrave brings gravitas to her supporting role as the spinster.

H