The Notebook : Movie Review

 THE NOTEBOOK

Director :  Nick Cassavetes

Genre : Drama/ Romance

Cast : Ryan Gosling (Noah), Rachel McAdams (Allie) and others

Release Date : June 25, 2004

Rating : 4.7/5

Duration : 2 hrs 4 mins

Language : English

Reviewed By : Shravni D Borade

Duke (James Garner), who has survived two heart attacks, finds tremendous joy in reading to Allie (Gena Rowlands) from a journal about an exciting love tale at a retirement home. She has dementia and has an odd sensation she has heard this story before.

Noah (Ryan Gosling) is a high school graduate who works at a lumber yard in Seabrook, North Carolina, in the 1940s. He meets Alison (Rachel McAdams) at a fair and it's love at first sight. She is the daughter of a rich Southern couple on vacation in town (Joan Allen and David Thornton). Noah and Alison go to the movies on their first date and discuss a lot about themselves on the way home. She is quite busy, despite the fact that she has not yet graduated from high school, with a bevy of tutors preparing her for college. Noah inquires as to what she does for fun, and she admits to being a painter.He has reawakened some primitive instincts in her that she was unaware of. Yet this young man, who makes barely forty cents an hour and is conversant with Walt Whitman's poetry, understands that nothing will ever be the same after one evening with this lovely lady.

While they are from different socioeconomic groups, their summer love affair blooms despite the fact that she is a wealthy Southern beauty "with the world at her feet" and he is a rural kid who doesn't "have two dimes to rub together." They disagree on many issues and quarrel frequently, but Noah and Alison recognise that they are soul mates, meant to spend their lives together in love. Of course, her snobbish parents are a serious barrier; they believe he is nothing more than white trash and will never be able to adequately care for her. Noah is saddened when Alison is obliged to accompany her family on their journey north.

They split ways, both disappointed that their romance ended in such a sad and dismal manner. Despite the fact that Noah writes to Alison every day for a year, her mother intercepts the letters to ensure that they never meet again. After losing his best buddy Fin (Kevin Connolly) in World War Two, Noah comes home to live with his father Frank (Sam Shepard). Noah's father has sold their home so that they may buy a run-down Southern mansion constructed in 1772, a project Noah has wanted to complete for years.While he works on the estate, burying his need for Alison, she studies college and begins dating Lon (James Marsden), a wounded soldier she met while serving as a nurse's aide. He is gorgeous, intelligent, and charming, and he hails from one of the wealthiest families in the South. Her parents are overjoyed that she has met the perfect man for her. Nevertheless, just before the wedding, Alison comes upon a newspaper image showing Noah proudly standing in front of the mansion he had renovated. She can't believe what she's seeing and decides she has to see him again.

Nick Cassavetes directs this wonderfully played and heartfelt love drama based on Nicholas Sparks' novel. This picture has a depth of feeling and visual complexity that two earlier adaptations of this talented writer's novels, Message in a Bottle and A Walk to Remember, did not have. Ryan Gosling, Rachel McAdams, James Garner, Gena Rowlands, and Joan Allen deliver outstanding performances that help launch this love drama into our hearts.

Duke remarks at one point: "I am certain that I am nothing remarkable. I am a common man with common thoughts and a common existence... but I have always loved somebody with all my heart and soul, and this has always been enough for me." Some viewers will find it easy to critique the story's melodramatic elements, but not us. We appreciate the film's emphasis on how intimate relationships frequently bring out the warrior in us. Obstacles must be overcome, and heated and hostile conflicts must be addressed as both parties compromise. Class warfare takes a terrible toll on these two soul lovers in this scenario. They are forced to dance on the precipice.

The Notebook distinguishes itself from other films in this genre by refusing to ignore the role that class plays in separating people in the name of money and power.