The Sparks Oeuvre: The Best of Me (novel)

The Best of Me is Sparks' 10th novel, released a year after Safe Haven. He's definitely gotten into a certain mode at this point, but also trying to mix things up just a bit and trying his hand at larger casts, more tragedy, and outright villains. The Best of Me has all of that, but it's also essentially the same story as The Notebook. 

Dawson and Amanda meet as teens in small town Louisiana. He's from the well-known for all the wrong reasons Cole family, and Amanda is from the upstanding Collier family. Despite social and economic divides, and the strong opposition from her family, Dawson and Amanda fall in love. After an incident with his family, Dawson is taken in by Tuck, a local widower who becomes a loving paternal figure to both of them. Tragedy strikes, though, and Dawson is the cause of the death of a local doctor after a car crash one night. He gets sent to jail and him and Amanda lose touch. 

Until twenty-five years later, when Tuck dies and his lawyer contacts both Dawson and Amanda as they are requested to spread his ashes at his requested place. Is this their second chance? Dawson has never lost his love for Amanda. Amanda is married to a man who became an alcoholic after their youngest daughter died of cancer. Over the weekend that they spend together, orchestrated by Tuck from the grave, they know that they still love one another. BUT. 

Amanda is married. Y'all, I know that marriage is a big deal. But I also know that sometimes people shouldn't be married anymore. It's not a failure to recognize that one's marriage is no longer working and it can't be fixed. That's especially true if you love someone else. Amanda admits to Dawson that on her wedding day to Frank she was thinking of him. If her and Dawson hadn't been reunited due to Tuck's passing, she would just go on living her life with an unfulfilling marriage. 

Her weekend with Dawson is a chance for her to assess what she really wants and make a choice. But she doesn't do any of that. She tells Dawson to tell her what to do. When she goes through the reasons why she can't end her marriage they are all based on the emotions of others and not what she wants or needs. Frank wouldn't be able to handle it, he'd drink even more. The kids would be traumatized. She'd be breaking up her family and leaving them.

None of that is true though. Of course she shouldn't be callous to Frank's feelings, but his reactions and how he handles a possible divorce are on him. The kids would likely not be traumatized, as long as her and Frank are still both committed parents. And she would not be breaking up the family. It's not as if her and Dawson are planning to run away together to Italy and never see her kids again. Getting divorced isn't "breaking up the family"; you're still a family regardless if you're divorced. As a child of divorce myself, I know that it can be hard. But it's truly better for everyone in the long run when it's the right choice to make. Parents are people outside of being a parent, and they deserve happiness too. Life is too short to be in a relationship that isn't right. It's good for kids to see their parents be in healthy relationships (be that with another partner or staying single). 

But Dawson and Amanda don't talk about any of that. They choose to be martyrs, as if it's virtuous of them to neglect their own happiness and well-being to "do what's right." That's not virtuous, because at some point the kids will grow and move out of the house and then it's just these two people who aren't right for each other. 

So, unlike Allie in The Notebook who realizes she can't marry Lon even though she made a promise to him because she loves someone else, Amanda chooses to return to her home and husband. Just in time for her son to get in a car crash and need a heart transplant. At the same time, Dawson is involved in a family altercation which, sadly, makes him an organ donor. You can deduce what happens next. 

Sparks fills his story with a large, yet mostly unimportant, supporting cast. Where he used to keep his stories limited to his main couple with a few people around them (generally disapproving parents or a close confidant), he now spends time with Amanda's son and husband, Dawson's cousins that are out to get him even still, his cousin's girlfriend, the widow of the local doctor he accidentally killed in a car crash, plus her son. It is A LOT and most of the time I don't enjoy Sparks' characterization of supporting characters, and it always feels a bit silly when he writes "bad" language or describes a character's sinister thoughts. I would have preferred a story that was confined to Dawson and Amanda, but then I guess it would have really just been a retelling of The Notebook. 

Since I didn't grow up in a small town and I never had a high school romance with someone who was from "the wrong side of the tracks", I always feel like the emphasis on those things are super extreme. Do parents really forbid their children from seeing someone because they are from a bad family? Are the strict social roles that people adhere to really a thing? It just always rings so false to me. 

I thought I wasn't going to like this book because I had seen the movie and considered it "the cheating movie." Well, first, I thought I had seen the movie but when I watched it last night it turns out I hadn't seen it other than maybe twenty minutes. And second, it's not really a cheating movie, depending on what constitutes cheating to you. Dawson and Amanda don't cross that line (even though Sparks makes us think they did until several chapters later) but they do kiss and share emotional intimacy. 

If I'm meant to believe that Dawson and Amanda are soulmates who have carried torches for each other for over twenty years, then of course I'm rooting for them even if Amanda is married. Which is a weird thing to do. I don't condone cheating, however I also see the intricacies involved that led these two people to make the choices they did. I'm not here to judge them on that; I'll just comment that if Amanda was truly happy and fulfilled in her marriage a weekend with Dawson would not have posed a problem. 

I didn't dislike the novel, but I oftentimes felt frustrated with Dawson and Amanda for not being more assertive and honest in their feelings for one another. Amanda's mom straight up tells her that she's too afraid to make a choice and wants someone to do it for her, which is basically the worst person in the world making a correct statement. And in the end Amanda doesn't actually have to make a decision anymore, because Dawson dies. The tragedy was a bit much in this one and I honestly just wanted them to be happy together. 

The Sparks Oeuvre: Safe Haven (movie)

Tagline: You know it when you find it. 

IMDb description: A young woman with a mysterious past lands in Southport, North Carolina where her bond with a widower forces her to confront the dark secret that haunts her. 

Roger Ebert review: sadly, Roger Ebert passed away a couple months after this film was released, and therefore the review on his site is not by him. 

Female protagonist: Katie (Julianne Hough)

Male protagonist: Alex (Josh Duhamel)

Star supporting cast: just Cobie Smulders as Katie's friendly neighbor, Jo

Background: This is the 8th Sparks movie adaptation, coming just a year after The Lucky One. By this point, the studio knows exactly what they're doing to promote this film and who the audience is - it's released on Valentine's Day and announces that it's from the author of "The Notebook" and "Dear John". It's always "The Notebook" that is referenced, as it's seen as the high-water mark that all other adaptions should strive to emulate. It also references "Dear John", which seems a bit weird to me because "The Lucky One" is a better movie and the more recent of the two. Julianne Hough was starting to make a name for herself separate from Dancing with the Stars, and Josh Duhamel was dipping into leading man/rom-com roles after stints in the Transformers movies (and starring as Tad Hamilton in one of my cheesy rom-com favorites, Win a Date With Tad Hamilton). 

Katie (Hough) is quite literally looking for a safe haven. She's arrived in Southport by catching a last minute bus after fleeing something dangerous. She's on the run, but we don't yet know why. We do know that she wants to be alone and live a quiet life, just living in a small cottage in the woods and waitressing at a local restaurant. Katie doesn't have a car, so she walks everywhere including the local "grocery store" run by handsome widower and dad of two Alex (Duhamel). He gives her a bike, they spend a day at the beach with this kids, they fall in love. But what is Katie's secret past?!

The movie wants us to think Katie has done something truly terrible because a cop is chasing her. When Alex sees her face on one of those "Wanted" posters he is incredulous that the woman he's just fallen in love with is in trouble with the law. He confronts Katie and she decides to leave. Alex recognizes his mistake and has the classic "chase after someone before they leave" moment, this time at a ferry. She then tells Alex she's not running from the cops, but A cop: her abusive husband. 

This is entirely different from the book and I hate the change. In the book, Katie is secretive about her former life with Alex because she's afraid of being caught by her husband if she gets too comfortable. Alex intuits a lot about her based on his background as a criminal investigator in the military (this back story is completely gone in the movie). He pieces a lot of it together but tells Katie she only has to tell him what she's comfortable telling. And then she does, because she's building trust in their relationship. The movie just ruins all of that for the cheesy "oh no I made a mistake I need to run after them."

In my opinion, the novel tells the story in a better way. It doesn't make us guess about Katie's background, and it tells how she tried to get away several times and she planned her escape for months. It's great character-building for Katie, and a lot of that is lost in the movie (although I do think Hough does a decent enough job). 

This is the second time that a Sparks adaptation is directed by Lasse Halstrom (he did Dear John, too). He's the only director to repeat in the Sparks Oeuvre, which I guess is something. He's a good director, but I think he's saddled with a somewhat bad script. The script jettisons much of the backstory of both Katie and Alex, to the detriment of both. They then become just attractive people that fall in love, which isn't bad but also leaves this film a bit....shrug, I guess. 

The Sparks Oeuvre: The Lucky One (movie)

Tagline: I can't find one. 

IMDb description: A Marine travels to Louisiana after serving three tours in Iraq and searches for the unknown woman he believes was his good luck charm during the war. 

Roger Ebert review: two and a half stars ("Luck is putting it mildly")

Female protagonist: Beth (Taylor Schilling)

Male protagonist: Logan (Zac Efron)

Star supporting cast: Blythe Danner as Beth's nana; Jay R. Ferguson as Beth's ex-husband, Keith Clayton

Background: This film is the first Sparks adaptation to be directed by an Oscar-nominated director! Scott Hicks was nominated for Best Director for "Shine" back in 1996. He didn't win, but he directed Geoffrey Rush to a Best Actor Oscar. This film came out four years after the last High School Musical movie, and it's Efron's push into being seen as an "adult" actor and not just that kid who made musicals for Disney. It works because he is....not a kid in this movie :)

The movie starts with Logan (Efron) providing voiceover about how life can change quickly and we never know when it will. We then go to Logan in Iraq. A morning after a night raid, he just standing around the rubble when something gleaming in it catches his eye. He steps over to it and finds a picture of a woman with the words "Be safe" written on the back. Then an explosion occurs right where he had been standing....finding the photo literally saved his life. He keeps the picture (after asking around to no avail to see if it belongs to someone), and he ends up surviving a few other near-death experiences. His friend and him joke about how the woman in the picture has made him lucky. 

Logan returns home and, feeling awash and that he owes this woman a thank you, he sets out on foot from Denver to Louisiana (he did some internet sleuthing to find the town where the picture with the woman was taken in. Just go with it; as Ebert says in his review: "I'm not going to say anything at all about the odds of that happening. The odds are overwhelming against anything in any movie happening, so I should just shut up and pay attention.").  

He finds her, he doesn't tell her at first why he's there, he starts working for her and her Nana at their dog kennel, they fall in love, she finds out he has the picture and is angry, he feels bad, someone dies, and they end up kissing in the morning sun. It's all very romantic. 

The film keeps the basic story of the novel, but tightens it up. It spends much less time detailing Logan's time in Iraq (it's just the opening scene) and gets way less into the detail with Beth's ex, Keith (the novel has chapters that were from his point of view and I hated them). It also doesn't explicitly address that Logan is kind of a stalker. In the novel Beth actually confronts him and tells him he's a stalker. The movie softens this a bit and never outright says that his behavior is definitely obsessive. However, when a person is attractive or we like them, then actions that would generally seem stalkerish and obsessive get overlooked (especially in movies!). 

I've said it many times before, but having a good director that can get good performances from his actors makes all the difference. It's what elevates mediocre Sparks adaptations to great ones. Zac Efron gives a wonderful performance; he's quiet, contemplative, never moving more than he has to, forceful when he needs to be, charming, and romantic. Taylor Schilling, at this basically unknown and starring in her first movie (lucky her!), really sells Beth. She plays every emotion across her face and in her eyes, she's vulnerable and a little unsure of herself and when she gets her big moment of standing up for herself she nails it. 

This is also probably the most sexy of the Sparks adaptations. I know we have The Notebook, which has really been the only one to have an out-and-out sex scene, but to me this one is better (and hotter). It's a different relationship between Logan and Beth. Noah and Allie fell in love young and are both loud characters; Logan and Beth are the opposite and while their connection is no less strong, beautiful, and passionate it is displayed and conveyed differently (and really directed and acted well by everyone involved). 

This is likely in the top three of Sparks movies for me, probably second after A Walk to Remember, even with it's slightly melodramatic ending that sees someone die (this IS Sparks after all). Logan and Beth are characters I like (and her son Ben is truly adorable in every sense). I accept the misunderstandings and untold secrets because they are two lonely and lost people that needed to find each other and I want them to get their happy ending. 

The Sparks Oeuvre: The Last Song (movie)

Tagline: A Story About Family, First Loves, Second Chances, and the Moments in Life That Lead You Back Home

IMDb description: A rebellious girl is sent to a Southern beach town for the summer to stay with her father. Through their mutual love of music, the estranged duo learn to reconnect. (this description is so weird because music is honestly not what helps them reconnect)

Roger Ebert review: two and a half stars ("Miley Meets Cute over a spilled milkshake")

Female protagonist: Veronica "Ronnie" Miller (Miley Cyrus)

Male protagonist: Will Blakelee (Liam Hemsworth)

Star supporting cast: Greg Kinnear as Ronnie's dad; Kelly Preston as Ronnie's mom; Bobby Coleman as Ronnie's brother (I only note him because he was the kid star of the movie I worked on in 2009, Snowmen 

Background: the second Sparks adaption to be released in 2010, the only time there were two Sparks in one year. This came two months after Dear John and was the first to have a screenplay by Sparks himself. He actually started the screenplay first as a vehicle for Miley Cyrus, which made reading the book interesting. This film is also infamous/famous for being how Miley Cyrus and Liam Hemsworth met. They dated on/off for ten years before getting married in late 2018 and then divorced in 2019. (Yes I know too much because it's one of those celebrity relationships I was inexplicably invested in.)

Since the screenplay is written by Sparks, there's not too much that's different from the novel. Sparks is still trying way too hard to make Ronnie an outcast. When she first arrives, against her will, for a summer with her dad and brother, she walks on the beach and gets stared at by all the other girls there in their swimsuits. Because Ronnie is wearing jeans and boots. That would get stares from anyone; it does not make Ronnie an outcast or the others girls mean. 

Sparks, however, loves his gender stereotypes and almost all of the girls are mean and have it out for Ronnie. The mean girls try to break up Ronnie and Will by giving her bad information. Will even says the classic, tropiest of lines "You're not like other girls." Yes, Ronnie is different because she wants to save sea turtle eggs nesting near her dad's home and is....nice. It's all very surface-level. 

Which is to be expected, as this is a story centered on teens and their drama, angst, and love. It's fine for certain demographics, but I'm beyond the age where any of it feels compelling. 

The story ends in sad tragedy, as Ronnie's dad is dying of stomach cancer. He's kept it a secret (is this a thing people do in real life?) so he can enjoy one final summer with his kids. He and Ronnie patch things up before he passes, and it's actually very sweet that Ronnie chooses to stay and take care of her dad when the summer is over. 

If you're curious about seeing a celebrity relationship where it began, this could be a good watch for pure anthropological purposes. If not, then it can definitely be skipped. 

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.