If you’d like to see screenwriters do some serious mental gymnastics just to get a pair of lovers to meet cute, then “Letters to Juliet” may be worth a look.

Sophie (Amanda Seyfried) is an aspiring writer and a girl in love. But wait, her fiancé, Victor (Gael Carcia Bernal), is soon to open a restaurant forcing them to take their honeymoon trip before he’s tied up running the place and conveniently, for the purposes of our plotline, before they tie the knot.

Sophie and Victor head off to Verona, Italy, city of Romeo and Juliet and a solid choice for a romantic get away. But wait once more, Victor’s heart has been stolen by his beloved restaurant. He keeps running off to taste truffles and attend wine auctions leaving poor Sophie to wander the streets of Verona alone.

On one of her solitary walks, Sophie happens upon a courtyard that was supposedly home to the famous balcony scene in “Romeo and Juliet.” She discovers a note written fifty years ago to the mythical Juliet tucked into a crevice in the wall. She also bumps into a group of women, Juliet’s Secretaries, who make it their mission to answer the many letters left at the wall every day. Sophie writes a response to the letter and a few days later the grandson of Claire (Vanessa Redgreave), woman who wrote it, barges into the office of Juliet’s Secretaries outraged that someone had gotten grandma all in a tizzy about some long lost love.

But wait yet again if you will. As Sophie, Claire and her grandson, Charlie (Christopher Egan) set off to find Claire’s lost love Lorenzo are those romantic sparks fueling the constant bickering between Sophie and the chronically irritated Charlie?
We’re going to find out, but only if we can stay awake. After constructing this Byzantine set up, the collective creative inspiration of director Gary Winick and his writers, Jose Rivera and Tim Sullivan, collapses in a heap.

What should be an entertaining romp as Claire tracks down one wrong Lorenzo after another, as her young companions bring their romantic chemistry to a repressed simmer, is derailed by the most formulaic writing and directing this side of the Lifetime Channel. This is a film that relies heavily on pretty shots of the Italian countryside and perky pop tunes to keep our attention focused on the screen. If you stop the count the missed comedic opportunities in that long parade of false Lorezos you might actually be lulled into falling asleep.

What saves “Letters to Juliet” from becoming a truly forgettable experience are the two remarkable actresses at its center. Vanessa Redgrave may be the most unsettling screen presence of a generation. Her piercing blue eyes radiate an unlikely combination of serenity and hunger. When she fixes that stare on a costar, the silliest dialogue seems to have its source deep in the soul. It’s easy to believe in Claire, even at this late stage in life, as somebody’s lover.

Amanda Seyfried is no slouch as an actress. With her Angelina Jolie eyes, she commands the screen even when sharing it with Redgrave. In fact, the best chemistry in “Letters to Juliet” bubbles up between the two. Bernal and Egan as Sophie’s love interests hardly seem worth the trouble, but Seyfried wins you over to Sophie’s side and seduces you into wanting good things for her.

While “Letters to Juliet” wants to captivate us with the questions of whether, and with whom, Claire and Sophie find love it’s the acting that grabs your attention. The clichéd script is like an obstacle course and the real entertainment is watching these two exceptional actresses create compelling performances with virtually nothing to work with.

Directed by Gary Winick
Rated PG
** (Two stars)