The Notebook

Another Ryan Gosling film, apologies if you are not a fan of his, it's not done intentionally. I met someone who said that this film was their favourite film, until then I had heard negative feedback of it so I became more interested in watching it- hence the post today.

James Marsden, Rachel McAdams and Ryan Gosling stake their claim for being the names on the posters but the name that stole the show, should have been on every poster and the face that should have gone with it was that of Gena Rowlands. I recognised that face instantly from NCIS (Gibbs' mother in-law) and Numbers. Her face is recognisable, there can be no doubt about it, if you have seen her in something then you will know that face anywhere. For all the top class displays from the names mentioned above there was no one better in the film than Gena Rowlands.

The Notebook takes that approach that so many films now do where they start towards the end and then use the older characters to explain how they reached that point with flashbacks. Gena Rowlands is the much older Allie Calhoun and Rachel McAdams is the younger Allie Calhoun, the woman who falls in love with a young man called Noah (Gosling), a young man from the wrong area compared to the very upper class Calhoun family.

I don't know how appropriate or socially acceptable it is to make a woman go out with you by hanging off the edge of a building until she says yes- I would like to think that it is completely unacceptable and that the woman would then later be able to reject the man if she did not want to go out with him and that would be okay. Needless to say that is how Noah convinces Allie to go out with him and then when she tries to turn him down later well it's too late and they end up going out anyway. Kids don't try that at home, it wont do you any favours and will only make the woman less interested in you.

Parents don't like Noah so they do whatever it will take to break up Noah and Allie including move out of the state. For a year their lives are far away and separate and then Allie meets an officer (Marsden) and the become engaged. We all know what will happen- she loves Noah so she spends a couple of days with him, they have sex and then she goes to talk to her fiancee, telling Noah that she is going back to her other life only to come back a few days later after talking to Marsden about things.

The film has one of the most beautiful spins and happy endings ever. It's not my favourite film but it is worth watching and a brilliant piece of work.