`MAIL' MAKES A SPECIAL DELIVERY.

Byline: Glenn Whipp Daily News Film Critic

Nora Ephron's delightfully frothy romantic comedy, ``You've Got Mail,'' goes out of its way to endorse a set of latter-day institutions - America Online, Starbucks, super bookstores - deemed questionable in the eyes of many consumers.

But it's highly unlikely many will find fault with the movie's most celebrated institutions, its eminently likable stars Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan. They're at their agreeable best here, too - Hanks doing his finest Jimmy Stewart; Ryan taking perkiness to new heights. Only someone who has seen ``Your Friends & Neighbors'' one too many times could resist their charms.

``You've Got Mail'' is a shrewd update of Ernst Lubitsch's little-seen, 1940 charmer ``The Shop Around the Corner,'' which starred Stewart (making the Hanks casting even more of a slam dunk) and Margaret Sullavan as feuding clerks in a small curio shop who unknowingly fall in love through a lonely hearts club. In Ephron's witty version (which she co-wrote with her sister Delia), Hanks and Ryan play battling bookstore owners who anonymously exchange soulful e-mail messages (bagels, butterflies and Jane Austen are among the topics).

It turns out both Joe Fox (Hanks) and Kathleen Kelly (Ryan) live in the same Upper West Side neighborhood (glowingly rendered in such a way to make a native New Yorker either boast or laugh in derision). Kathleen runs a charming children's bookstore, A Shop Around the Corner (nice nod to Lubitsch), that's being threatened by the imminent opening of a Fox Books superstore. (Think Barnes & Noble.)

Joe and Kathleen meet early in the film and are immediately attracted to each other, even though both are otherwise involved. But when Kathleen finds out Joe's last name is Fox (as in that Fox), she is immediately repulsed, telling him, ``Instead of a brain, you have a cash register. Instead of a heart, you have a bottom line.'' And who does she turn to for comfort? Her cyberpal, who happens to be, naturally, the one and only Mr. Joe Fox.

Of course, this being Hanks and Ryan, there's a limit to how far their rivalry will go. Yes, Joe is a corporate raider who laughs when another independent bookstore goes under. But, at home, Joe cuddles up with his golden retriever and composes poetic e-mail. As for Kathleen, sure, she tells Joe off, but later she feels bad for being a meanie.

``You've Got Mail'' could have been too cute by half, but Ephron leavens the goo with a host of acerbic social observations on relationships, cyberdating and the attachment men have to ``The Godfather.'' (``It's the I Ching, the sum of all wisdom,'' Hanks says in one e-mail message.) Only toward the end, once some of the story's tension has been resolved, does the film falter. But by then, the picture has accumulated so much good will that you can forgive any minor missteps.

Hanks and Ryan are capably aided by a supporting cast that includes Jean Stapleton and Steve Zahn as Ryan's bookstore cohorts and Dabney Coleman as Hanks' bimbo-chasing father. Parker Posey and Greg Kinnear play the romantic entanglements that inevitably must be cast aside for our favorite couple to prevail.

Ephron could well have given these wonderful actors more to do; indeed, reports indicate that she had to cut many of their scenes to pare down the film's running time. It's just as well. ``You've Got Mail'' rightfully belongs to Hanks and Ryan. Their pairing here is even better than ``Sleepless in Seattle,'' if only because they're given more to do together. It's a winning combination - one, with any luck, we'll have a chance to enjoy again in the future.

THE FACTS

The film: ``You've Got Mail'' (PG; mild language).

The stars: Tom Hanks, Meg Ryan, Parker Posey, Greg Kinnear, Jean Stapleton, David Chappelle, Steve Zahn and Dabney Coleman.

Behind the scenes: Directed by Nora Ephron. Screenplay by Nora and Delia Ephron. Released by Warner Bros.

Running time: Two hours.

Playing: Citywide.

Our rating: Three and one half stars.

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Photo

Photo: In ``You've Got Mail,'' Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan play rival bookstore owners who exchange soulful e-mail messages.