Tom Hanks made it all too easy for those of us wedded to the notion that he is a Jimmy Stewart for our times when, in 1998, he starred opposite Meg Ryan in the email-based romantic comedy You’ve Got Mail. This, of course, was a digital upgrade of the analogue 1940 favourite The Shop around the Corner, whose leading man was – you’re way ahead of me – James Stewart. They played the same part, one in black and white, the other in colour, separated by half a century.

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Comparisons between the two decent, courteous, approachable, white, middle-class Hollywood everymen always prove irresistible – even though it might seem unfair to compare a living actor with an icon who could easily take his place in the cinematic equivalent of Mount Rushmore.

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