High drama in romantic tear-jerker
ššš THE BEST OF ME. Director: Michael Hoffman. Starring: James Marsden, Michelle Monaghan, Luke Bracey. Showing at: Boardwalk. GRAB a tissue and get ready to have your heartstrings tugged in this Nicholas Sparks melodrama, replete with its elements of love and loss. Like The Notebook, the narrative plays out in two timeframes relating an impossible love affair involving a girl who trusts in the stars, a boy from the wrong side of the tracks, his abusive father and a surrogate father.
The perfect date movie, the film is romantic in the purest sense with dramatic highs and lows that sweep you along – with beautiful settings and a rousing score.
When the film begins, Dawson (James Marsden) is reading a Stephen Hawkins book on the oilrig where he works. He looks at the star-filled sky deep in thought. Cut to Amanda (Michelle Monaghan) looking at the stars from another part of the country, telling her teenage son she used to think destiny was written in the stars.
So begins the story that reunites Dawson and Amanda after 20 years, triggered by a call from an estate attorney, advising them of the death of Tuck (Gerald McRaney), a mutual friend. He is the catalyst now, as he was years ago, when they first met.
In flashback, we learn how Dawson meets Tuck, after his father (Sean Bridgers) abuses him and he is looking for somewhere to stay.
We become involved in Dawson and Amanda’s love story – how they meet, fall in love and face seemingly insurmountable problems involving both their families.
Aussie hunk Luke Bracey and Liana Liberato are both appealing as the younger couple.
“I wouldn’t mind doing this again,” Dawson says of their first kiss that naturally is followed by another – this time in the rain. The narrative flits back and forth, the film’s climax occurring when we learn what triggered the end of their relationship years ago.
Marsden and Monaghan are delightful together and while it is easy to sense their chemistry, it is hard to reconcile Bracey being the younger version of Marsden.
The melodramatic storyline with its high drama plot points is par for the course and tears rolled down my cheek on several occasions, no doubt to the tempo of director Michael Hoffman’s baton. – Louise Keller