The Notebook

100 Movies Bucket list.

From 2004 is Nick Cassavetes’s adaptation of Nick Sparks’s The Notebook. James Garner’s Duke is a cheerful care home resident, who reads from his Notebook to help another resident, Ms. Calhoun, who is suffering from dementia. He tells the story of Noah (Ryan Gosling) a country boy who falls for Allie (Rachel McAdams) a wealthy girl holidaying with her parents in his small town of Seabrook. As the summer draws to a close Noah shares his dream of rebuilding the dilapidated plantation mansion for them. Allie’s parents have different ideas and when they leave Seabrook, Allie doesn’t get to say goodbye. As time passes life moves on Noah goes to war, Allie meets Lon (James Marsden) who she is to marry. But when Allie returns to Seabrook before her wedding old feelings are rekindled. All the while Duke hopes that this story of love and loss can help bring Ms. Calhoun back from the clutches of dementia.

Let’s get to it, this is an old fashioned love story engineered to rinse the emotion from its audience. You know exactly what is to come as it borrows heavily from films before it.

But as engineered and obvious as it is I’d be lying to say I didn’t enjoy it. It has a real sweetness and charm. In Gosling and McAdams are two hugely engaging leads. While this is early work from both it’s no surprise they develop the careers they do. With Goslings performance one that he leans on so brilliantly in La La Land. Alongside them there is great support, Garner and Rowlands in their supporting story and Joan Allen as Allie’s scheming mother.

And it would be wrong not to mention a wonderfully done final act in Duke’s and Ms.Calhouns story, which powerfully shows the devastating impact of dementia on those with the illness and those close to them.

The Notebook is a paint by numbers love story, there are no real surprises with the story signposted throughout. But that is not to say there isn’t lots to enjoy, it’s full of charm with two hugely engaging sets of leads. You know your emotions are been manipulated from start to finish, but you really don’t mind.