Review of Notebook, The

Introduction

Ooh goody, "The most romantic movie since Titanic" (which I detested) and "Heart-wrenchingly romantic" screams the box. An old fashioned period love story from the deep south of America. Not one for me in a cynical mood.

An old woman in a home is told a story of first love from before and after the Second World War. Noah and Allie are from different backgrounds, can love conquer this great divide once more? I expect that you know the answer.....

Video

An excellent 2.35:1 anamorphic transfer greets you on this disc, as you would expect from a film that`s only about a year old. Everything on screen is clean and crisp, with nice warm colours and plenty of detail, and a pleasing lack of dirt and dust.

Audio

A choice of DD2.0 surround or DD5.1 soundtracks. As you might guess from the blurb, this is not one for showing off to your friends, and the soundtrack just makes the odd use of all of your speakers now and again (some music and the odd atmospheric sound). Most of the time is just dialogue coming from the centre speaker.

Features

A beefy selection of extras for such a low key release.

We start with a couple of commentary tracks, one from director Nick Cassavetes, the other from writer Nicholas Sparks. Both commentaries go into plenty of detail, with Cassavetes concentrating on the film-making process and things from behind the scenes, and Sparks talking about the background to the story and what`s different from in his original novel.

Next up we have a selection of deleted and alternative scenes, lasting for about half an hour, with optional editor`s commentary. Some were trimmed for time, others to satisfy the quest for the most child friendly rating at the cinema (though I don`t know many children that would want to sit through this).

All In The Family: Nick Cassavetes is a featurette concentrating on the director, which doesn`t really tell you anything interesting about him, just lots of people queuing up to gush.

Nicholas Sparks: A Simple Story Well Told concentrates on the author of the original novel, but again doesn`t tell you much of note.

Southern Exposure: Locating `The Notebook` is a short featurette on the Charleston and Carolina locations used in filming. There`s also another section on the casting where you can see how the 2 leads got the part and also watch a screen test.

Finally we have another great "spoil the whole film in 2 minutes" trailer.

Conclusion

As I mentioned earlier, this is not my kind of film. "The most romantic movie since Titanic" is never going to win me over no matter how hard it tries because I am genetically pre-disposed to hate these films. Not necessarily something to be proud of I know, but weepy romance films just leave me cold.

It`s all just too stereotyped for me. Boy from the wrong side of the tracks meets posh girl. They fall in love. Posh girl`s family disapprove, they move away, boy`s heart is broken. Boy goes off to war, comes back, eventually meets girl again. You just know it`s all going to end happily ever after. Just once, it would be nice if something else happened.

Ok, it`s pretty good at its job, but I don`t want to watch it do its job. I`m just not the type to get swept up in the big romantic epic. I just sit there going "no, that shouldn`t happen, he should be doing that, that other thing should be happening" etc. Everyone is doing their job well, it`s just not for me.

The DVD itself is an excellent package, with good picture and sound rounded out with a nice selection of extras, even though some of those extras don`t exactly get very in depth.

If you like weepies, then chances are you`ll like this. If you`re just too cynical for it all, leave well alone.