When Harry Met Sally... · reception & legacy
1989 · Rob Reiner
How When Harry Met Sally... has been received, argued over, and remembered.
The arc
A hit in 1989, though some critics initially dismissed it as Woody Allen-lite; decades on, it's flipped from 'derivative' to the actual template — the rom-com every other rom-com gets measured against.
What's debated
Film fans still relitigate its central thesis — can men and women really be friends? — with the film's own answer treated as either romantic wisdom or the genre's original sin.
Its footprint
"I'll have what she's having" — delivered in Katz's Deli, where a sign still hangs over the table — is one of the most quoted lines in movie history, and the fake-orgasm scene has been parodied everywhere.
Where it stands
The consensus gold-standard rom-com: a comfort-watch classic, an autumn-in-New-York seasonal ritual on Letterboxd, and the anchor of the Nora Ephron canon.