The Sparks Oeuvre: Dear John (movie)

 Tagline: What would you do with a letter that changed everything?

IMDb description: A romantic drama about a soldier that falls for a conservative college student while he's home on leave (this is truly a strange description that labels Savannah as "conservative" which has no bearing on the story). 

Roger Ebert review: two stars ("....heartbreaking story of two lovely young people who fail to find happiness together because they're trapped in an adaptation of a Nicholas Sparks novel.")

Male protagonist: John Tyree (Channing Tatum)

Female protagonist: Savannah Curtis (Amanda Seyfried)

Star supporting cast: Richard Jenkins, the best character actor out there, as John's coin-collecting dad; Henry Thomas as Savannah's friend/future love 

Background: This is the fifth Sparks adaption and also the fifth Sparks book! The movie was released in February, which is a perfect time for a Sparks movie to hit theaters as by this point a Sparks movie was shorthand for a romantic "chick-flick" and it likely had a marketing campaign geared towards Valentine's Day. Also, for whatever reason this film was not produced by Denise Di Novi, who had a producer credit on all previous Sparks adaptations except The Notebook. 

I think I like the movie adaption more than it's source. The movie makes some weird changes with characters that aren't necessary, but it also cuts out some unnecessary elements that make the story tighter. As with most Sparks adaptations, the movie leaves out all the religious stuff (it's pretty minor in this book). The director is truly the key to a good Sparks adaptation, and Lasse Hallstrom does a decent job with this one (he's the only person to director two Sparks adaptations). He has very pretty if not exceptional actors in Channing Tatum and Amanda Seyfried, but he manages to give each of them two knockout scenes. 

For Tatum, he actually gets two knockout scenes, which is fine because he's the main character. The first is when he's returned home immediately after 9/11. He gets a short leave before presumably re-enlisting, but doesn't know how to tell Savannah since he had been nearing the end of this commitment and both were excited for planning their future together. Faced with John being gone even longer and in a more dangerous situation is more than Savannah can take. John has a moment with Savannah where he just pours his heart out and ends with "just tell me what to do?". Tatum plays this so well, showing John's struggle between his commitment to Savannah and to the military. 

His second comes in my favorite scene (probably of all Sparks adaptations). His father is in the hospital near the end of his life. John and his dad have had a strained relationship most of his adult life, not for lack of love but for understanding. But since Savannah he had started seeing his dad differently and was understanding him better. He writes a letter to his dad, a letter that encompasses all his love. At first he just gives it to his dad to read later, but he realizes that's not possible and decides he'll read it out loud to his dying dad. Tatum knocks this out of the park. He has just the right amount of emotion. The quick tears leaving his eyes. And his dad slowly puts his hand on his head and the two hug and cry together. This brings me to tears every time I watch it. Both Tatum and Richard Jenkins kill in this scene. 

Savannah makes some truly baffling decisions, with the motivation seemingly being that she's in a Nicholas Sparks adaptation so there has to be angst. I don't want to downplay or overlook her feelings and how having John gone and the stress of worrying about his safety while's deployed affected her. BUT. Instead of, I don't know, talking through it with him or a professional, she instead starts writing less. Then makes the truly baffling decision to instead get married to a family friend who is sick with cancer and has an autistic son. She believes that being a wife, mother, and caretaker is an easier choice than waiting for John to come home. 

For most of the film, Amanda Seyfried plays Savannah as sweet and loving and frankly she doesn't have much to do. But near the end of the film she's given a scene that lets her showcase Savannah's pent up anger and exhaustion, as she tells John how difficult it was for her when he was away. I feel her struggle and pain. I just wish she had found a way to express that before she decided to tell him she was engaged when she Dear John'd him (also, the letter serves as a breakup letter but it's also her announcement to John that's she's engaged, so technically she cheated on him and that's not cool).

There is one truly baffling scene (it's in the book, too), where John is visiting Savannah in her new life. Somehow wine is spilled on both their shirts; John goes to the bathroom to wash it out (what??) and Savannah goes into her room to completely change her blouse (okay?). These are both baffling choices, but there are more! Savannah doesn't close her door when she's changing her blouse, also is not wearing a bra even though she was out riding and working with the horses earlier (not one to judge other women not wearing bras, but it seems highly unlikely in this scenario she wouldn't be wearing one), and John sees her in the mirror from the bathroom. They just stare at each other for a moment and it is truly bizarre. 

As mentioned previously, the truly moving relationship of the film is the one between John and his father. Richard Jenkins, who is marvelous in everything, plays John's father so quietly perfect of an adult man that was never officially diagnosed as on the Autism spectrum. John is always a little bit exasperated by him, as he's a good father that has provided for him but John has never been able to connect with him. They once shared a love of chasing and collecting coins, but John grew out of that. 

I feel like this review craps a bit on the movie, and gives the sense that I didn't care for it. And maybe it's not my favorite because of the scenarios that seem to only exist because a Sparks plot dictates strife and tragedy. However, the scene with John and his dad always redeems it for me. Give it a watch if you've never seen it. 

The Sparks Oeuvre: Dear John (novel)

 Nicholas Sparks' fifth novel is Dear John, published in 2006 and 4 years after his previous novel, Nights in Rodanthe. It's in stark contrast to that novel - focusing on young love, autism, duty to country after 9/11, being in the military, and moving through and past relationships. It was inevitable in my eyes that Sparks would write a story that uses 9/11 as a story device. Lots of people have done it since then, and art is nothing if not a reflection of the time it is made in.  

This Sparks story gives us John Tyree, on home for two weeks of leave in Wilmington, N.C. (classic Sparks setting) where he meets college student Savannah Lynn Curtis. She's also there for a few weeks building a home for a family, Habitat for Humanity-style. They meet when he retrieves her bag when it falls off the pier and into the ocean. In true Sparks fashion, they fall and it's deep and fast in two weeks. John has to leave back to Germany due to his commitments to the Army, and they agree to write to one another while he's gone. Their life and plans for the future are interrupted by the terrorist attacks of 9/11, and after he reenlists much to Savannah's dismay he eventually receives a "Dear John" letter. 

The story is told from John's point of view, and it, surprise surprise, starts in the present and then has John tell us the story. This is entirely unnecessary; it doesn't add any suspense to the story and it's only used at the beginning and the end. Several of his other novels had the narrator checking in during the present but that doesn't happen here. For whatever reason, Sparks likes his readers going into his stories questioning if the characters are still together. 

Because of this choice, Savannah isn't really a full character. She's kind of like Jamie in A Walk to Remember. She's there to help the main character on his journey. That's not a bad thing outright, but I kind of like his stories more when they focus on both the male and female protagonists. Sparks writes her as deferential. Whenever her and John get into an argument, she always says "You were right." even though, in my opinion, that is incorrect! 

For his part, John has what I would say are some issues with anger. Savannah shares an honest thought about John's dad with him, and while possibly a bit out of line it wasn't hurtful or mean. John yells at her, then gets in a fist fight with the dudes Savannah is working on the house with. When Savannah shares that she was sexually assaulted her first year of college, John's reaction is not to comfort Savannah but instead say that he'll beat the guy up (and Savannah sincerely is like "thank you so much that means a lot" like whaaaaaat?). When they get into another argument based on competing expectations of their time together when he's on leave again, he's rude and again yells at her. And she again is like "You were right, I'm sorry."

Also, John and Savannah's guy friend, Tim, talk a lot about Savannah in a way that seems....not inappropriate but slightly uncalled for. Tim provides a lot of feedback and acts as a sounding board for John, when really he should have been talking to Savannah. The gender dynamics are a bit weird, to say the least. 

Sparks gives Savannah and John a real predicament in their relationship - how to keep it strong and together when one half of the relationship is across the world? He does highlight the strain it puts on the relationship during the small interludes they get when John is on leave. However, he squanders most of it by having Savannah send the "Dear John" letter because basically the two can't communicate. It feels like a Katie/Greg from The Bachelorette situation and it's overall just frustrating. 

What's interesting about Dear John is that Sparks has a secondary relationship that feels just as important as the romantic one - the one between John and his dad. It really is quite beautiful to see John accept his dad for who is, and then to take care of his dad as his health deteriorates. In some ways it's better than the relationship between John and Savannah. 

The book is good, not great.

The Sparks Oeuvre: Nights in Rodanthe (movie)

 

Tagline: It's never too late for a second chance. 

IMDb description: A doctor, who is travelling to see his estranged son, sparks with an unhappily married woman at a North Carolina inn. 

Roger Ebert review: one and a half stars ("A Leaky Weeper" is the title of a truly great review)

Male protagonist: Dr. Paul Flanner (Richard Gere)

Female protagonist: Adrienne Willis (Diane Lane)

Star supporting cast: Viola Davis as Adrienne's best friend; Christopher Meloni as Adrienne's cheating husband; uncredited James Franco as Paul's son; Mae Whitman as Adrienne's daughter

Background: Gere and Lane starred together as married couple in 2002's Unfaithful, the Adrian Lyne sexy thriller that earned Lane an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress. That same year, Nights in Rodanthe was published, and made it's way to this adaptation in 2008. As the fourth Sparks movie adaptation (and fourth adaption!), it's the first to nearly completely miss the mark. 

For the most part, the story from the novel is the same. However, for the first time in the Oeuvre, the changes that were made for the screen feel detrimental to the film. The biggest change, for me, is the update in Adrienne's marital status. In the novel, she's been divorced for three years, but in the movie she's just separated from her cheating husband. Separated is still married, and I just don't like that this means Adrienne is technically cheating. This change effectively removes the lovely arc in the book of Adrienne and Paul both having the new versions of themselves post-divorce be discovered and loved by someone else. 

The book uses the Sparks-loved device of flashback to tell the story. None of the adaptations have kept this device (except, of course, The Notebook, as it's actually integral to the story) and this is the first time where I felt like it was actually needed. Without it, we lose all sense of Adrienne's journey. We lose the scope. We lose meaning in her choices and the way she has learned to live with the loss. None of it translates with the shortened time frame of the film. 

 Nights in Rodanthe underscores how important the director is in making a Sparks adaption really work. Director George C Wolfe has a great cast, but he mostly squanders it. Gere and Lane were great as a married couple in Unfaithful, and they do their best here but are saddled with a bad script and very bad staging. Wolfe bizarrely stages a dinner scene between the two where I was sure Gere wasn't actually there and Lane was acting against a stand-in; then he frames them each against a yellow wall in medium close-ups and it looks so very bad. He can't direct a proper kissing scene, as I was sure Paul was going to devour Adrienne's face. The visual effects are terrible, and the post hurricane scenes are laughable when their intent is to be tragic.  

This adaptation felt distinctly like most involved did not understand the essence of the book, and just wanted to cash in on the popularity of the last Sparks adaptation, The Notebook; at this point in the timeline of the Sparks Oeuvre it's become the standard and created/enforced the shorthand we know today as "a Nicholas Sparks movie." Unfortunately, it takes more than attractive actors to make a good Sparks adaption.