Meg Ryan

Remember Bo Derek's braids in "10"? Dorothy Hamill's "wedge" cut, and the flurry of copycat hairstyles it generated? Farrah Fawcett's tousled, multilayered mane?Well, don't be surprised if you start hearing women asking their hairstylists for "Meg Ryan hair."Starring in "Prelude to a Kiss" with Alec Baldwin, Meg as Rita plays a pretty, perky, sometimes zany, serious, ethereal lead in the movie.Though she does wear a memorable wedding gown, it's her hair that catches the eye. Long, blond, wavy, sometimes a bit crimped, other times hanging in long tendrils or pushed up and back loosely, Meg has that kind of "important" hair that some young women will lust after.

The author and filmmaker Nora Ephron, who died Tuesday night, had a famous love affair with food. Ephron was the maven who knew where to get the best coffee cake, cappuccino and smoked salmon in New York City. She didn't just back into the idea of making the (kind of) Julia Child biopic, "Julia & Julia," her last movie. The movies Ephron made are full of food-love. There's Meg Ryan's "high-maintenance, dressing-on-the-side instructions to waiters in"When Harry Met Sally" -- I just want it the way I want it. " That same movie, of course, is responsible for one of the most famous restaurant scenes in movie history, set in Katz's Delicatessen.  A cookbook writer is the heroine of "Heartburn," the movie version of Ephron's novel into which she threaded some of her own favorite recipes.

"When a Man Loves a Woman" wants to be about what happens when a woman loves a bottle, but it's really about what happens when a producer wants a hit.What happens isn't pleasant, particularly if the bottle is filled with vodka, but the movie is filled with cuteness. For whatever the implications of its materials, the film is still a big Hollywood production, financed and released by Disney's grown-up Touchstone division -- and one feels the play of contradictory impulses all the way through it, the struggle between social realism and entertainment values.

Meg Ryan wants a change. Badly. After more than a decade of romantic-comedy roles, at which she became a modern-day master, Meg aspires to more. She's tried playing an Army hero (Courage Under Fire). Last year, she tried showing considerable amounts of skin in a dark murder-mystery (In The Cut). Now, in Against the Ropes, she's playing a female boxing manager from the Bronx. Someone needs to tell her that a mark of wisdom is understanding one's limitations. Based loosely on the life of Jackie Kallen, whose success in the late '80s proved something of a shocker to the all-boys club of boxing managers, the movie casts Ryan as an underappreciated secretary to an obnoxious fight promoter.

Not since Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor carnally charged "Cleopatra" has the off-screen chemistry between a film's co-stars raised such a ruckus - or provided such a built-in audience. As has been well-documented in gossip columns, scandal sheets and celebrity magazines, Meg Ryan and Russell Crowe became an item during the filming of "Proof of Life," which means audiences are waiting to find out one thing: Does all that real-life lust show up onscreen? I guess it does; Ryan and Crowe look at each other with full awareness that each is staring at one of the world's beautiful people.

If only love were as certain as romantic comedies make it out to be. Even in the complicated "Addicted to Love," in which the hero and heroine are out for revenge on the lovers who dumped them, you know the two leads are pawns of amorous destiny. Especially in a Meg Ryan movie!That means that the journey is more important than the predictable conclusion, and in this case, the journey is fraught with fun.Matthew Broderick plays Sam, a small-town astronomer whose love for a school teacher (Kelly Preston)

There are only two people in the room -- the bald guy with the tape recorder and the thin, adorable, blond actress -- and one of them is lying.The bald guy says he's a journalist; who would lie about something like that? The blond woman says she is not a movie star.Maybe Meg Ryan really is not a movie star, despite her 22 films and her starring role in "Addicted to Love," the dark comedy with Matthew Broderick that opened Friday. They play jilted lovers who join forces to exact a devious revenge on their ex-partners.

The results are in. Lightning can't strike twice.Nora Ephron, who made the overpraised but widely adored "Sleepless in Seattle," has re-convened the magic couple of Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan for the romantic comedy "You've Got Mail." The result may deserve top honors as this year's most egregious cinematic travesty. This ungainly remake of Ernst Lubitsch's 1940 romance "The Shop Around the Corner" commits the unforgiveable sin of attempting to improve on perfection. Indeed, between "Meet Joe Black," "Psycho" and now this, Hollywood obviously needs to be reminded of a timeless verity: it's the bad movies that need to be remade, you idiots, not the good ones.

Meg Ryan wants a change. Badly. After more than a decade of romantic-comedy roles, at which she became a modern-day master, Meg aspires to more. She's tried playing an Army hero (Courage Under Fire). Last year, she tried showing considerable amounts of skin in a dark murder-mystery (In The Cut). Now, in Against the Ropes, she's playing a female boxing manager from the Bronx. Someone needs to tell her that a mark of wisdom is understanding one's limitations. Based loosely on the life of Jackie Kallen, whose success in the late '80s proved something of a shocker to the all-boys club of boxing managers, the movie casts Ryan as an underappreciated secretary to an obnoxious fight promoter.

Meg Ryan seems to play the same role in almost all her movies, the girl-next-door who finds unexpected love, but her fans don't seem to mind if the chemistry works. And it works, really works, in the charming romantic comedy "French Kiss."Breezier than "When Harry Met Sally . . . " and a lot sassier than the saccharine "Sleepless in Seattle," prime examples of the Meg Ryan subgenre, "French Kiss" sustains a light touch and still manages to be touching.Aglow with energy, Ryan gives her character both innocence and brains.

In the Cut is a disaster. Familiar to the bone, arty on the surface, it could serve as the doomed pilot for a nightmare TV spinoff: Law & Order: Literary Victims Unit. Meg Ryan plays a college creative-writing teacher involved with an NYPD homicide detective (Mark Ruffalo) who is investigating the murder and mutilation of a woman in her neighborhood. Directed by Jane Campion (The Piano) and co-written by her and Susanna Moore from Moore's high-style atrocity of a novel, it applies a patina of word-play and symbolism and a pretentious visual technique over routine elements from any woman-in-jeopardy thriller.

Kate and Leopold has been considerably tinkered with over the past couple of weeks. Here's betting they haven't tinkered enough. Truth in advertising time: Although I first saw this movie nearly a month ago, I have not seen the version being released in theaters today. Neither has any other critic in America: Last week, frantic word went out from Miramax that two scenes and one minor plot thread were being removed from the film. The final version would not be ready for any previews. Judging by what the studio said in its press release, there's good news and bad news about the cuts.

Not since Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor carnally charged "Cleopatra" has the off-screen chemistry between a film's co-stars raised such a ruckus - or provided such a built-in audience. As has been well-documented in gossip columns, scandal sheets and celebrity magazines, Meg Ryan and Russell Crowe became an item during the filming of "Proof of Life," which means audiences are waiting to find out one thing: Does all that real-life lust show up onscreen? I guess it does; Ryan and Crowe look at each other with full awareness that each is staring at one of the world's beautiful people.

I talked with Rob Hiaasen on the phone the other day. Naturally, I was surprised to speak with Rob Hiaasen on the phone. Surprised because I, Rob Hiaasen, thought I, Rob Hiaasen, was the only Rob Hiaasen on Earth. (Don't we all think we're the only ones in the universe?) My discovery -- which may rank with the recent DNA-sequencing discovery as the two single greatest accomplishments of the new century -- began as all cosmic breakthroughs do: simply, serendipitously. I, Rob Hiaasen, was performing a search on Yahoo, an Internet service that, among other neat things, can find anyone if this anyone has a listed phone number.

The results are in. Lightning can't strike twice.Nora Ephron, who made the overpraised but widely adored "Sleepless in Seattle," has re-convened the magic couple of Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan for the romantic comedy "You've Got Mail." The result may deserve top honors as this year's most egregious cinematic travesty. This ungainly remake of Ernst Lubitsch's 1940 romance "The Shop Around the Corner" commits the unforgiveable sin of attempting to improve on perfection. Indeed, between "Meet Joe Black," "Psycho" and now this, Hollywood obviously needs to be reminded of a timeless verity: it's the bad movies that need to be remade, you idiots, not the good ones.

Though not up to the best of Disney, 20th Century Fox's "Anastasia" (7 p.m.-9 p.m., HBO) is a frequently delightful animated take on the legend of Anastasia, the youngest daughter of Russia's last czar, Nicholas, and his wife, Alexandra. Meg Ryan, at her sauciest, is the voice of the young czarina, who escapes the violent fate of the rest of her family and ends up in an orphanage, with no memory of who she is. Some of the animation is quite stunning, particularly a dream sequence staged in the czar's former palace.

Though not up to the best of Disney, 20th Century Fox's "Anastasia" (7 p.m.-9 p.m., HBO) is a frequently delightful animated take on the legend of Anastasia, the youngest daughter of Russia's last czar, Nicholas, and his wife, Alexandra. Meg Ryan, at her sauciest, is the voice of the young czarina, who escapes the violent fate of the rest of her family and ends up in an orphanage, with no memory of who she is. Some of the animation is quite stunning, particularly a dream sequence staged in the czar's former palace.

Kate and Leopold has been considerably tinkered with over the past couple of weeks. Here's betting they haven't tinkered enough. Truth in advertising time: Although I first saw this movie nearly a month ago, I have not seen the version being released in theaters today. Neither has any other critic in America: Last week, frantic word went out from Miramax that two scenes and one minor plot thread were being removed from the film. The final version would not be ready for any previews. Judging by what the studio said in its press release, there's good news and bad news about the cuts.

Finally, here's proof an animated film doesn't have to be Disney to be good."Anastasia," the new feature-length animation from 20th Century Fox about a princess whose destiny finds her, is every bit as good as most of its Disney predecessors and better than many. Filled with sparkling animation and appealing characters, it's a film that should keep the kids happy and their parents entertained -- even as it leaves historians with their mouths agape.The story opens in the waning days of Czarist Russia, as young Anastasia (voiced by Kirsten Dunst)

There are only two people in the room -- the bald guy with the tape recorder and the thin, adorable, blond actress -- and one of them is lying.The bald guy says he's a journalist; who would lie about something like that? The blond woman says she is not a movie star.Maybe Meg Ryan really is not a movie star, despite her 22 films and her starring role in "Addicted to Love," the dark comedy with Matthew Broderick that opened Friday. They play jilted lovers who join forces to exact a devious revenge on their ex-partners.