Walk to Remember: I Love It And I am Baffled By My Love For It

Let’s get one thing out of the way: Nicholas Sparks’ “books” make me angry. I cannot stand his writing and what he represents in general, and so watching the movie, my rational mind screams: “CHEESY! CHEESE-BALL! STUPID!” And yet my heart and my emotions are engaged with it every time I see it. It’s rather baffling and yet I have chosen not to question it.

Here are my observations of the film.

— Shane West is not a good actor. But … but … why do I like him in this movie? I cannot say. There is one scene where he drives back from going to his father for help – and he cries in the car as he drives. The STRAIN he puts into producing ONE MEASLY TEAR is almost painful to watch. He knows he must cry, but he has no idea how to – well – how to act, frankly. He has no technicque to rely on – so he sits there, scrunching up his face, trying to force tears to come. And yet … there are moments when he moves me in this film. I can’t explain it. I see his badness, and I forgive it. Apparently, he the actor has now gone off the deep end – and there are many funny and disturbing photos of him on this or that red carpet, looking scruffy, wasted, and corrupt. You can kind of see it coming in his acting in this film. He got the LEAD in a big romantic movie. And … then what happened? Nothing, really. Nothing really happened in his career. And you know why? Cause he’s not good enough. And so now he is bitter, doing drugs, and looking like HELL.

–Another bad-actor moment is the very last moment of the film. He stands on a pier, staring out at the sunset, remembering his lost glory with his now dead wife. There is a voiceover. The movie assumes that we are all stupid in the audience and we need a VOICEOVER to tell us that Jamie changed his life, and made him a better man. Sigh. Voiceovers should only be used extremely sparingly – or they should be used consistently throughout an entire film as a narrative device (think about Danny Devito’s voiceover at the beginning of LA Confidential – it’s perfect – or the kick-ass voiceover stuff in Good Fellas which is genius) – but they should NEVER be used to tell us something we already know – or should be able to figure out just from looking at an actor’s face. Don’t TELL me. SHOW me. So anyway, he stands there – the sunset light on his face – the voiceover says: “Jamie changed me forever … she taught me to fly … she taught me to love … she taught me to pick my ass … and she taught me to yodel …” whatever. And as this oh-so-obvious voiceover happens – Shane West does a terrible thing. I am sure he was directed to do this terrible thing – it looks like a director’s choice – and so it’s somewhat forgivable – but anyway – he SMILES. It’s just so bop-you-over-the-head obvious that it’s nauseating. And it’s too bad because the last 10 minutes of that film I think are intensely moving and effective. I mean that. They didn’t need a voiceover, and they certainly didn’t need him to SMILE as the voiceover happened. The director didn’t trust his own story. He was probably like: “Hmmm … we need to make it clear that he won’t grieve forever … that her presence in his life was a GIFT … so Shane … could you smile just a little bit as you look at the sunset?” But we already KNOW that her presence was a gift, we know that he will not only be fine – but his entire life will be a tribute to this amazing woman he knew for such a short time. Ah well. But they didn’t trust it. So we have: 1. Sunset light 2. Sappy music 3. Voiceover telling us what we already know 4. Shane West SMILING, by himself, staring out at the sunset. It’s way too much.

— I just love the Mandy Moore character, Jamie. I just love how … she constantly surprises me. You think she will be one way, and she is SO not that way. Mandy Moore went about creating this young girl with great compassion and intelligence. She has her own mind. But she lives by her faith as well. Many many people on the planet have that combination in them – and yet it’s so rarely portrayed effectively in a film. I love Jamie.

— I also think that the Peter Coyote role – of the stern-faced minister who is Jamie’s father – is wonderfully played, and also wonderfully written. We have the stereotype of the prudish anti-art anti-fun anti-youth minister (ahem – Footloose????) and we’ve seen that and done that. It’s based on reality – I’ve met people like that, and I’m sure you all have as well – but they do something different with this man. He loves his daughter, he wants to protect her, he also literally cannot face losing her. That one moment when he says, “When I lost your mother, I thought my heart would close forever …” and his guilt at knowing that he took it out on his daughter for a while. He is a deeply human man. And she is the most precious thing in the world to him. But I love, too, how he is nobody’s fool – and Shane West really has to step up to the plate and be courageous in order to court this man’s daughter. He has to ask permission, he has to face the wrath of the minister if he gets her home late – all that stuff. Also, the film is interesting because it holds back the information about her leukemia … and so we THINK the minister is just being strict because he thinks she’s too young to date, yadda yadda – and that’s true too. But there’s something else going on. He scolds her at one point, when she tells him, “I love him, Dad …” – and he says, “Then be fair to him, Jamie.” At the point that he says that, we do not know that she is dying. So it seems like all he is saying is: “You can’t have premarital sex – if you love him, let him go – be fair to him …” which is also a valid point. But no – it’s deeper. I think he does a wonderful job in this role. It’s all very unexpected – and not a stereotype – and you just end up LOVING that father SO MUCH. At least I do. I love him.

— What kind of Drama Club do they have at that school? It’s unlike any Drama Club I’VE ever heard of. Landon, as part of his community service punishment, has to participate in the school play. Uhm – what? And then – based on a lackluster group read-through – he is given the lead. In a student written play. The student-written play has bound scripts – like little books, little Samuel French books. Again – what? Makes no sense. And, of course, once they do the production – the set literally looks like it’s come from Broadway. It’s not as unrealistic as the school play set in Jersey Girl but it’s close. I remember the ‘sets’ we had in our public high school – and the paint jobs were slapdash – I mean, we got the job done, we painted the flats, put them up … but you could tell they were hand-made. These sets were immaculate and looked like a dinner theatre’s sets.

— What kind of a name is Landon anyway?

— More on the school play: during the “big scene” between Landon and Jamie – when he ‘improvises’ a line (oooh, he’s such a daring actor) – they are speaking so softly that no one in the audience could realistically hear them. They are not PROJECTING. They sit and have their whole scene in close-up. I know that the scene isn’t about the school play – it’s about him admitting his love for her – but still. It’s kind of silly to have two teenagers basically whispering their lines in a huge auditorium and expect us to believe that this is a school play.

— This is just a random comment: and I don’t know why this occurred to me last night, but it did – there are a couple of scenes in the cafeteria. And last night that set just looked SO FAKE to me. The person in charge of production design did not do a good job. It looks like the set from Saved by the Bell. There are no adults in the cafeteria. There is no random background noise. When a confrontation occurs, the entire room goes silent. There are venetian blinds on the windows. It’s all just so obviously a set.

— I love the scene when he shows up at her house and gives her the pink sweater. It’s just … so sweet. I love her response.

— Darryl Hannah looks awful in this movie. Her acting is okay, but I am distracted by her brunette hair and her collagen lips.

— I think my favorite scene is when Landon finds out his estranged father will pay for Jamie’s home care and he drives to his father’s house to thank him. The father opens the door – and … I just love that actor. He probably has 3 lines in the film. He knows he messed up with his son … he doesn’t know how to make it better … and there is his son on the doorstep, in tears (this time it looks real) – and suddenly he grabs his son, and holds him tight, and hugs him to death. There’s a closeup of the father’s face, and he is literally GRIPPING onto his son’s back, holding him as close as he can. That scene just GETS me every time.

— I also get tears in my eyes every single time I see her walk down the aisle. It’s not so much her walking down the aisle – as the reaction shots of everyone in the congregation – Landon’s friends, Landon’s ex-girlfriend, Landon’s parents … all of these people who thought he was nuts … but there they are, smiling up at her as she walks by. His tough little friend who got into the altercation with him in the fake cafeteria – there he is in his suit, smiling up as she walks by. IT KILLS ME. IT GETS ME RIGHT IN THE HEART EVERY TIME.

— I love how Jamie, despite her strong faith, is not a prude. This is another stereotype that they do not utilize in this film and it is so refreshing. Yes, she’s a Bible-reading good girl. But she also wants a tattoo, and scolds him, “Yes, I’ll help you with your lines, but you have to promise me you won’t fall in love with me.” It’s such an interesting moment when she says that. It’s kind of funny and cute, at first – but once you know she’s dying, it takes on a greater meaning. The girl is not an idiot. She is not naive to the ways of the world. I love too when he goes to kiss her for the first time – and she says, “I might be bad at it.” It’s such a sweet moment. You can see that they are actually falling in love – it’s quite realistic, I thought.

— I also love the moment when Landon is working on the telescope (watch how Shane West ACTS the SHIT out of that construction scene – you know he has NO IDEA what he is supposed to be writing down – uhm, calculations? What?? – but still: it’s good enough, it’s passable … it’s the thought that counts) … anyway, for some reason he works on the telescope at a table set up in Jamie’s yard – deep into the night – I never got that. I don’t understand why he doesn’t work on it at home?? But anyhoo. I love the moment when Peter Coyote comes outside with a lantern and a mug of hot tea. I just … it’s a quiet moment … and unlike the last moment in the film when we are treated like MORONS – it’s an interesting and kind of mysterious moment. We don’t know WHEN Coyote decided to let this boy into his family, but … it happened. I love that moment.

— I also love the two quiet scenes when Landon’s two best friends make up with him – after giving him grief about dating Jamie. They are simple scenes – with not a lot of words in them – which is very effective. Less is more. You just know that when the day is done – the friends decide that they are gonna stick by Landon, and that he needs them. They give up their own egos, and go to him to be his friend, to see what he needs, to be there for him. Good scenes, both of them.

— I could go on and on. But this is all for now. A lovely movie – I recognize the cheesiness … but the film still WORKS.