Dear John
Lasse Hallstrom
The story: While on home leave in South Carolina, Special Forces soldier John Tyree (Channing Tatum) meets college student Savannah Curtis (Amanda Seyfried) and the two fall in love. They keep up a steady stream of correspondence when he heads back into service but events, political and personal, keep them apart.
Author Nicholas Sparks is turning into a one-man industry the way John Grisham dominated the 1990s with his legal thrillers.
Dear John is the fifth of his 15 published novels to be adapted for the big screen and another, The Last Song, is on the way.
In works such as The Notebook and Message In A Bottle, fans have swooned over this idea of a pure love that endures, often in the face of personal tragedies and other obstacles.
Clearly, they cannot get enough of Sparks as Dear John even ended Avatar’s two-month reign atop the American box office when it was released early this month.
While the new film revisits a similar theme, there is some freshness in the casting of the appealing actors Channing Tatum and Amanda Seyfried. Ex-model Tatum (Public Enemies, G.I. Joe: The Rise Of Cobra) is looking more square-jawed with each film and he exudes a reserved, military bearing that strikes the right note for the character. Seyfried, from TV’s high school detective series Veronica Mars (2004 - 2006), proves she is ready to step into leading lady roles.
The two make for a believable couple and almost get away with a hokey bit where they say something about the moon being the same size regardless of where one is in the world.
The problem is the curveball that is thrown at the audience simply for the sake of keeping them apart. It involves Tim (Henry Thomas, best known as the boy from 1982’s E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial), a family friend of Savannah’s. The development makes no sense even when Savannah tries to explain to John what happened.
There is a moving love story here but it is not the one you think. Rather than the romance, it is the relationship between John and his father that tugs at the heartstrings more.
It is suggested that Tyree senior is autistic and Richard Jenkins, nominated for an Oscar last year for Best Actor for the drama The Visitor, turns in an understated performance.
Swedish director Lasse Hallstrom has been accused of mawkish sentimentality but he handles the prickly familial relationship admirably.
It is touching and true in a way that John and Savannah’s thwarted love never is.
(ST)