Review: Dear John

Back in 2004, The Notebook became a cult hit, the overly-soppy romantic drama made stars of Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams and made a lot of girls cry in the process. Now another of Nicholas Sparks' novels has been adapted for the big screen, that being Dear John a story of love found and lost, very similar then to The Notebook. The story concerns the titular John, a soldier on leave, who meets the very blonde, very beautiful Savannah. They inevitably hook-up and throw each other long, meaningful looks she is very priveledged and likes doing things with horses, while not exactly poor he comes from a less well-off family and has a father with mental difficulties who enjoys collecting coins. After John has to return there is a middle section of the film in which our two characters simply write each other letters, which is incredibly dull. Then 9/11 happens and John decides to go back and fight in Afghanistan angering his love and basically splitting them up. The final third of the film mainly centres on John as he tries to struggle with revelations about Savannah as well as his father's medical health.

While I've only seen bits of The Notebook I can tell you that this doesn't do half the job that Sparks' previous adaptation did. Having your two romantic leads seperated for the majority of the film isn't a good idea in my book and they both have to be strong enough to hold the audience's attention if you do. While Ryan Gosling managed this in The Notebook, Channing Tatum doesn't pull it off at all in Dear John. Although alright in ensemble dramas, Tatum isn't good when being a leading man he doesn't change his facial expression once in the movie and he seems to have his shirt of constantly obviously to please the female cinema-goers. Its a shame as well for Amanda Seyfried, who is a decent actress, that she gets stuck with the lesser of the two roles basically reacting to the actions of John and the other characters. Although she is presented as a 'zany, free spirit' I didn't really feel this and at times thought she was just plain hurtful. The only glimmer of hope in the cast is Richard Jenkins, who does his best with what he's given as John's father.

The worst thing about this film is it exploits a lot of tricky subjects, and often glosses over, them to advance the plot. For example not one, but two of the characters have autism or other learning disablities, one of the characters contracts cancer and of course 9/11 is the trigger for the final third of the film action but again it is really presented as anything more than that. I was surprised to find out that Lasse Hallstrom was the director of this nightmare, I usually enjoy his films such as Chocolat and The Cider House Rules, fluffy as they are they are still tightly directed and engaging. With Dear John its obviously Hallstrom has just taken the money and run while Sparks it seems is now branching out as a screenwriter with a script for The Last Song, the new Miley Cyrus film. If it is anywhere as bad as this I urge to steer clear. If you are dragged to see Dear John I think the only thing you will take from it is a better apprecation of the world of coin-collecting, and that's it.