IMDb description: The story of two North Carolina teens, Landon Carter and Jamie Sullivan, who are thrown together after Landon gets into trouble and is made to do community service.
Roger Ebert review: 3 stars (he calls it "a small treasure")
Male protagonist: Landon Carter (Shane West)
Female protagonist: Jamie Sullivan (Mandy Moore)
Star supporting cast: Peter Coyote as Jamie's dad and Darryl Hannah (in a truly terrible wig, per the DVD commentary) as Landon's mom
Background: This film came out at the start of the second semester of my freshman year of college in January 2002. I feel pretty sure I saw it at the theater in Ephraim, UT but I can't find my ticket stub. However, I remember very clearly my BFF, Lindsay, and I being obsessed with it that summer when we returned to Pocatello. We rented it (bought it?) and watched it several times. We even watched it with the commentary from Adam Shankman (the Director) and Shane West and Mandy Moore. We were obsessed with the soundtrack (it slaps y'all). Lindsay even got her hair cut like Mandy Moore (not in the film, but in the "Cry" music video). Lots of nostalgia wrapped up with this one. I did my re-watch for this project with my friend Rachel and we had a great time watching it.
As with Message in a Bottle, the basic story from the novel makes it's way to the screen. But once again, the medium of film brings the story to life and adds to it. First, the film swaps out the 1950s for present day; this change feels critical. Second, movie-Landon is more of a present-day cool kid (in the book he's Student Body President and planning for college, in the movie he's smart but doesn't really try at anything because that's not cool), and movie-Jamie gets a lot more personality and feels like a person rather than a device.
The love story in Message in a Bottle was adult and earnest. In A Walk to Remember, it's two high school seniors falling in love so one might think that it's more simple, or trite, or even silly. While Theresa and Garret had to deal with very adult things in their adult relationship (dead wives, careers, different states), the obstacles Landon and Jamie face to their love are no less compelling or real; one just has to remember what it was like to be a teenager and to care what people thought of you and if you were cool. I don't entirely buy into school cliques and cliches because that wasn't my high school experience, but I do remember thinking what my friends would think if they knew I had a crush on a certain guy who wasn't our brand of cool.
Landon thinks he knows Jamie because they've been in school together since kindergarten; he can list off outward things about her - she wears the same sweater, sits at uncool Lunch Table 7, tutors kids on the weekend, and looks at her shoes when she walks - that he thinks means he actually knows her. It's like when we stalk our crush on the internet; we find out things about them but it doesn't mean we know them. Jamie knows that's what people think about her and she doesn't care because she knows those are just things about her. Landon is amazed by this; all he does is care what his friends think about him. So much that he can't really be true to himself. Jamie is a chance for him to forget about outward things and focus on real things.
When Jamie takes her turn to assess Landon, she does so with deeper things than just his outward characteristics. She recognizes the part he plays as the cool kid in school who has no cares because he's "too young to die." Which is especially poignant giving that Jamie is herself dying (though he doesn't yet know that and neither does the audience). It's interesting that Landon gives no real thought to the future; his only goal for the future is to just get out of Beaufort. He sort of lives in the moment. Jamie of course does think of the future because she knows she's sick and hers is limted. When she decides to take a chance on Landon, their first date is all about Landon having her live in the moment and Jamie having him think more concretely about the future. When he's confronted with her sickness he has to really think about the future, but he also finds a way to be present and in the moment with Jamie in her final months and that's really lovely.
That's why I love their love story. Lots of romances and love stories (even many by Mr. Sparks himself) have intense passionate love (what T. Swift would call red love). Landon and Jamie's is no less full of passion, but it's more stable and built on shared respect, support, and love. They bring out the best in each other and support one another (what T. Swift would call golden love). To learn, feel, and have that kind of love at 18 feels pretty remarkable, and that it's pulled off with such care throughout the film is pretty remarkable.
Lots of credit for the film goes to the director, Adam Shankman. He had only directed one film before this one, the Jennifer Lopez delight The Wedding Planner. But he was already known in Hollywood for choreography - he choreographed the out-of-nowhere prom dance sequence in She's All That and the Buffy musical episode "Once More With Feeling". He doesn't do anything terribly flashy with the camera, but he is able to get great performances from his leading actors. With his choreography and music background, I feel like he was particularly a good choice for relatively new to acting Mandy Moore, who had this point was mainly a pop star with only a small part in The Princess Diaries on her resume. At times you can tell she's working hard (the credits list "Mandy Moore acting coach", no shame, kudos to her for working on her skill) to convey all the right emotions. There's only one scene where I feel like she gets it slightly wrong, and that's when she tells Landon she's sick. He first misunderstands her as not feeling well based on the way she phrases it. When he says he'll just take her home and she'll feel better, she responds angrily as it it's his fault he's misunderstood her and it feels off to me; her tone needed to be more heartache than anger in my opinion. But she mostly plays Jamie as sincere, but also confident.
Music and wardrobe really have an impact on the story as well. The soundtrack is absolutely killer, with perfect songs at the perfect moments. The New Radicals singing over the montage of Landon practicing and rehearsing for the play, ending with him and Jamie passing in the hall IS SO PERFECT. Who doesn't remember being in high school and waiting for the moment(s) in they day when you would pass your crush in the hallway?! And wardrobe. I mean Landon in button-ups and baseball shirts is swoon worthy, and is epitome of cool guy. Jamie dresses simply but not frumpy; she is consistently and emphatically herself with her "uncool" outfits. She's always in stark contrast to the two "cool girls" that are part of Landon's friends group, and, thankfully, never has to suffer the indignity of having a makeover or changing her wardrobe once she starts dating Landon.
In the book, Jamie always has her in a bun UNTIL she starts dating Landon, at which point he comments that she starts wearing it down. In the movie Jamie is always wearing her hair in a low ponytail UNTIL she starts dating Landon at which point she starts wearing it down (or in a half pony sometimes, which honestly looks great). Nevermind that I think this is dumb because guys rarely IMHO notice things like that (and also I personally hate wearing my hair down) and why would Jamie even think about that every day, but whatever this was written by a guy who seems to think hair is an important part of a couple's relationship. (Not that hair isn't important....who hasn't drastically cut their hair Felicity-style after a breakup?! I just feel like Sparks gets the sentiment of a woman's relationship to hair in our relationships wrong - it usually changes as a result of a bad end not a fresh start. Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk.)
(Random aside: when I watched the DVD commentary, Adam Shankman said he actually received complaints that having Jamie in a ponytail perpetuated the stereotype that unattractive women wear ponytails. He was so taken aback because, he said, if that was true then why did he have Jennifer Lopez, an objectively beautiful woman, in a ponytail basically the entirely of The Wedding Planner?!)
Minor changes from page to screen include Landon being estranged from his dad because his parents are divorced, rather than his dad just being gone all the time because he's a Senator; the play is put on by the school in the spring instead of by the church at Christmas time; Jamie's dad, Reverend Sullivan (a great Peter Coyote), is a lot more likable and isn't crazy old (in the book he married a younger woman later in life and was quite old); and there isn't a weird family grudge between Landon's grandparents and Reverend Sullivan. Still the same: Landon's terrible friends.
The film is lovely and overall tells a better, more complete and engaging love story than the novel through direction, acting, music, and wardrobe. I say definitely give this one a watch.
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