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I'll certainly remember seeing this movie. I'll remember the
way that I wondered whether
a pop princess could succeed as an actress. I'll remember looking forward to seeing a
nightime-drama-tv-cutie in a leading role.
First the Mandy Moore issue. She's not terrible. She's not
great. Safely place your
bets that her performance knocks the bellyshirt right off of
the pop queen about to make
her film debut in "Crossroads". There is singing. It
is cheesy. But she's made a
somewhat graceful foray into the cinema.
And Shane West. Not disappointing. You get what you expect. If
you're a girl, you expect
him to look good. He does. You expect to imagine yourself in his lady's shoes. You do. Until
you realize the incredible amounts of mozzarella
and cheddar melted onto this movie. If you're a guy, you
probably have the foresight
to bring along crackers judging simply from the previews.
What I'll remember most about this cinematic experience is its
utter predictability, its
working the heartstrings until they bleed goop all over your perfectly good popcorn.
Loser High School Girl meets Popular/Misunderstood Popular
Boy. Actually, they've
known each other all their lives, but he's stuck to ignoring
her like everyone else
does, save for mocking the one sweater that she always wears.
His shenanigans are causing him problems and he's ripe to be transformed. When he's punished
into doing a lot of good in activities where
she is coincidentally already signed up out of the goodness of
her heart (tutoring on
Saturdays, etc.), they meet. He finds out that not all dorks
are boring. They become "secret friends," even when
she professes it's not what
she wants. They fall in love. Of course, everything isn't as perfect as it seems. Lives are
changed forever. It's as saccharine as it sounds.
"A Walk to Remember" is probably not as tough to
stomach as "Message in a Bottle",
but the fact that they both come from Nicholas Sparks novels
is all you need to know. If
you could handle that, you can handle this. If you can
get through paragraph one of the novel without rolling your
eyes right out of their
sockets, go for it. Enjoy. But please don't call it a
"film."
-- Liz
( 1 1/2 out of 4 pops )
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