Review

Serendipity is pure cotton-candy fluff, with Cusack and Beckinsale playing an adorable pair of strangers who meet cute and, through a series of happy accidents, become convinced they’re destined to be together. As chance would have it, they’re both otherwise involved, so they tempt fate by parting ways, each leaving the other a clue that might one day reunite them. Flash forward a few years and both are engaged to other people, but they can’t stop thinking about their one night together. Just days before his wedding, our boy John races across the country to find his soulmate, who herself has her own plans to find him. Since it’s practically preordained they’ll wind up together, the appeal of this sweet confection isn’t so much in the outcome but in the many comical diversions the story invents to trip them up along the way. Charming performances and a magical, snowy Manhattan backdrop heighten the romantic flavor.

 -- Steven D. Segal