Production Year: 2004 - Drama - Director: Nick Cassavetes - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over, 12 years and over - Starring: Rachel McAdams, Ryan Gosling, Gena Rowlands more
Based on the celebrated novel by Nicholas Sparks, THE NOTEBOOK tells the story of a young couple who overcome insurmountable odds to experience the true power of love. In a... more
The Notebook [DVD] [2004]
When you consider that old-fashioned tearjerkers are an endangered species in Hollywood, a ... more
movie likeThe Notebookcan be embraced without apology. Yes, it's syrupy sweet and clogged with clichés, and one can only marvel at the irony of Nick Cassavetes d...
The Notebook [DVD] [2004]
When you consider that old-fashioned tearjerkers are an endangered species in Hollywood, a ... more
movie likeThe Notebookcan be embraced without apology. Yes, it's syrupy sweet and clogged with clichés, and one can only marvel at the irony of Nick Cassavetes d...
The Notebook DVD
Behind every great love is a great story. Adapted from Nicholas Sparks' best-selling ... more
novel and directed by Nick Cassavetes (the son of legendary director John Cassavettes). A sweeping love story told by a man reading from his faded notebook (James ...
The Notebook
Behind every great love is a great story.As teenagers, Allie (Rachel McAdams) and Noah ... more
(Ryan Gosling) begin a whirlwind courtship that soon blossoms into tender intimacy. The young couple is quickly separated by Allie's upper-class parents who insist that Noah isn't right for her. Several years pass, and, when they meet again, their passion is rekindled, forcing Allie to choose between her soulmate and class order. This beautiful tale has a particularly special meaning to an older gentleman (James Garner) who regularly reads the timeless love story to his aging companion (Gena Rowlands).Based on the best-selling novel by Nicholas Sparks, The Notebook is at once heartwarming and heartbreaking and will capture you in its sweeping and emotional force.
The Notebook - CD
Main Title Overture I'll Be Seeing You Alabamy Home Allie Returns House Blues / The Porch ... more
Dance / The Proposal / The Carnival Noah's Journey Always and Always The Notebook A String of Pearls On The Lake Diga Diga Doo One O'Clock Jump I'll Be Seeing You Noah's Last Letter Our Love Can Do Miracles
Production Year: 1981 - Drama - Director: Franco Zeffirelli - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over - Starring: Brooke Shields, Martin Hewitt, Shirley Knight, Don Murray, Richard Kiley, Penelope Milford, Beatrice Straight
Production Year: 1995 - Drama - Director: Ang Lee - Original Language: English - Classification: Universal - Starring: Emma Thompson, Alan Rickman, Kate Winslet, Hugh Grant, Greg Wise, Hugh Laurie, Robert Hardy
A review by post-it-note on The Notebook (DVD) July 21st, 2006
Author's product rating:
Did you enjoy it?
Liked it
Story
Good
Characters / Performances
Outstanding
Special Effects
Standard
How does it compare to similar films?
Good
Advantages:
Cute, nice outfits
Disadvantages:
a bit too much sappiness for my liking .
Recommend to potential buyers:
yes
Full review
It would seem there is something wrong with me. I'm sure my friends have long suspected this to be the case but there's now irrefutable proof. I didn't cry in "The Notebook" and I didn't love the movie. I mean I didn't hate it, but glancing through other reviews there seems to be nothing but glowing reports of heart wrenching, soul touching weeping over this movie. It's my flatmates favourite movie and that's why we watched it, she had been raving about it for months.
Ill confess to being not much of a crier in general, but there have been times I have been known to cry over a movie. Armageddon gets me every time (No Bruce, don't stay on that asteroid - I love you!), My Life (the movie, not my life as I live it) made me cry and that movie with Jodie Foster and Richard Gere on plantation almost makes me cry just thinking about it. I have also read another book by Nicholas Sparks "A Walk to Remember" and shamelessly bawled over it. Though I watched the movie of A Walk to Remember and wasn't that impressed despite a secret and till now unconfessed admiration for Mandy Moore that even forgives her singing the lines "Your love is as sweet as candy, Ill be forever yours, Love always, Mandy". Any girl that got to date the lovely Zach Braff wins my vote. She gets a bigger vote for breaking up with him and leaving my path clear.
I would say something here like anyway, I digress - but even though I know the meaning of this word it always seems to me to be an argumentative word like disagree. It has an argumentative tone to it in my book. Now I really am off the path.. next I will be telling you words i do like - like tokidoki, which means sometimes in Japanese. What a cute little word.
The Notebook. We start with an elderly gentleman (James Garner) reading a story to a lady of a similar age. The lady is clearly dressed as though she has class and he clearly less so. The lady wears pearls and he wears some ugly jacket. The elderly couple are in a retirement home, not one of the self sufficient homes but one with a nursing staff. The lady has vague twinges as he reads that she has heard this story before but she isn't too sure. We learn she has senile dementia.
The story he reads to her take us to a summer fair in a small town. It tells of Noah (Ryan Gosling) who sees a young lady, Ally (Rachel McAdams) and instantly falls for her. He tries to get her go out with him, and frankly his persistence is a little irritating, and does a few crazy stunts before eventually getting their mutual friends to set them up on a movie date. So he gets the girl, involving an incident of lying in the middle of the road, and they fall in love. But of course there is a problem, the course of true love never did run smooth as the quote goes. Ally is rich and (gasp) Noah is poor, Ally is also to go to college at the end of summer, which is far far from Seabrook where Noah lives. There is an embarrassing moment as Noah meets Ally's family and friends for the first time and they ask him how much he earns and his response is 40 cents an hour.
Class conscious Mum of Ally begins to conspire against the lovers and a family argument, overheard by Noah, has Mum screaming, "he is trash". Realising Ally really is leaving for a better life without him Noah breaks up with Ally. Though there is a lot of yelling from both of them (because that is what this romantic couple do, fight) and I think its Ally who eventually screams "Its Over". Though she isn't sure that it's for real.
Next morning sees Mum packing Ally's bags and her family leaving town, with a quick goodbye to Noah passed through a mutual friend. Noah writes to Ally every day for a year, 365 letters. This dedication also irks me, who DOES that, and does it not smack of freak? Anyway of course Ally doesn't get the letters as Mum of Ally keeps them from her. Noah gives up on the letters and life goes on, but they don't forget each other.
Noah goes off to war and on returning home he rebuilds his dream house, a dilapidated mansion. Now the dream house of course has links to Ally, they slept together for the first time in one of its rooms and Ally and he had talked of their dreams to live there together and how she would like the mansion to be. She wanted it to be white. Guess what colour he paints it? Noah has a new girlfriend but he makes it clear he's not in love with her and that there is another in his heart. Noah doesn't shave and seems slightly nuts, it's the beard of course that is the indicator. Not that this means bearded chaps are nuts, but in the formerly clean cut Noah's case it can be taken as so.
Ally is not so dedicated to Noah. While working as a Nurse in the war she meets the handsome, yet still whipped, Lon (James Marsden). Lon proposes, she loves him and Lon is all that her family wants for her. As Lon proposes Noah's face flashes in front of her, yet she still laughs with delight as she accepts. Mum of Ally is beside herself with joy and approval.
Cut to a bridal store and the usually stylish Ally in an ugly bridal gown. Throughout this movie I had been loving her shoes and her dresses until the wedding gown. Women giggle as they flock around her and Ally is as happy as a woman can only be when she is a bride in a movie and trying on a wedding dress. You know the scene, squealing women and a beaming bride who laughs somewhat crazily. "Is the veil too much?" she asks. Yes Ally, it is. I have been with many friends while they bought their bridal gowns. Though they were of course happy not one of us has ever squealed.
Mum of Ally brings in the newspaper and Ally's wedding to the handsome Lon (not that Ryan Gosling as Noah isn't hot too, I just prefer the darker haired gents) is mentioned as the society wedding of the season. Mum beams with pride. Then the paper folds open and underneath is a story of Noah and his rebuilding of the mansion. Oh oh. How Mum missed this story I have no idea, she was so vigilant with the post and there was a big picture of Noah right underneath the story about Ally and Lon.
Meanwhile while all this has been going back on we have been switching back and forth between the old couple from the start of the movie as he reads the love story to her and they live their lives in the retirement home. There is no explanation of who they are or why they are reading the story. We are supposed to wonder, but honestly you know who they are. Its a little distracting really and I think a little too much attention is focused on the old couple and the dropping of hints as to who they might be.
As with the movie itself I'm going to switch back in time to the triangle of Ally and Noah and Lon. After seeing him in the paper Ally goes to see Noah and discovers that they really do still have that old zing. Lon the fiancé finds out, the Mum finds out, oh what will Ally do. Mum gives Ally the letters that Noah wrote her all those years ago. Lon tells Ally he loves and forgives her and still wants her. I would one day like to ask this (fictional) Ally how she wields such power over men, one loves and pines over her despite not having seen her for years and the other forgives her an affair.
And its here that I will leave off on the story as no one wants to give away an ending, though this movie is hardly known for its suspense and twist plots.
The Notebook is a cute little story that just goes on for a bit too long and perhaps comes with a bit too much sugar. There is nothing wrong with the Notebook, its just not as heart tuggingly romantic as it's painted out to be and I may have shifted in my seat a few times in bored moments. The acting is good, and like almost everyone else I do think Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams are gorgeous together and it's nice to know that they have a relationship off screen too. Ryan and Rachel met while filming the Notebook so it would seem that's why they have so much on screen chemistry. They are in Vancouver at the moment and apparently still acting like a cute couple very much in love. There is even a web site dedicated to their relationship, http://hands-clean.net/ryanrachel/.
Ally's mother, played by Anne Hamilton I particularly liked. She played the society mother, who does just want the best for her daughter, to perfection. I hadn't really come across her before but she received a best supporting actress nomination for the Crucible, a movie/book that i quite like, she was also nominated for the same award for Nixon. Sam Shepard is likeably enthusiastic as Noah's father.
The Notebook was Directed by Nick Cassavetes and based on the Novel by Nicholas Sparks.
The soundtrack is typical of what you would expect from a 40's based movie, but it's good and not too intrusive. A bit of Billie Holiday, Glenn Miller and Duke Eillington.
The Notebook was a pretty big movie when it came out in 2004 and so its available at the usual places, like Amazon. Its classified as 15+ (there's a few loves scenes not for the kiddies eyes).
In an interview with the writer he says the story was based on his wifes parents. They met as teenagers and fell in love, they seperated and she got engaged to someone else. She then went back to her teenage love and married him.
Update: Additional Info added There were no outstanding DVD features. A screen test with Rachel McAdams and some deleted scences. Yawn. The version i watched had English and Spanish subtitles only. This was a region 1 (USA and Canada) DVD.
Advantages: The perfect love story Disadvantages: None whatsoever!
The Notebook, which I?m sure a lot of you will already know, is widely known as one of the most romantic films of all time & if you?ve seen this I?m sure you?ll understand why. The Notebook was released 25th June 2004 & was received a mildly reasonable response from the critics, however it did extremely well at the box office, grossing an estimated $115.6 million worldwide on a budget of $30,000,000. The notebook is rated 12 & runs for approximately ... ...written by Nicholas Sparks.
The film is directed by Nick Cassavetes who ironically is the son of Gena Rowlands who plays Allie as a sick old lady. Nick has directed a few semi successful films including; Alpha Dog, She?s So Lovely & Unhook The Stars, however I?m certain that Nick Cassavetes will always be notorious for directing The Notebook. The two main leads in the film are played by Rachel McAdams who?s appeared in several films including; Mean ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: Excellent story and Acting Disadvantages: Made me cry!
...so glad I did.
The film starts off in a nursing home for elderly sick people where a man is being introduced to an old lady and he says he has come to read to her. He stars reading from his notebook and soon we find we are being shown the story. The story is about Allie, played by Rachel McAdams, who is a rich girl from a very well to do family. She goes to spend the summer in the country where she meets Noah, played by Ryan Gosling, who is a country ... ...and Noah spend the summer together and fall in love but are soon pulled apart by Allies parents who think that Noah is no good for her daughter. Noah writes to Allie every day but she does not get the letters. The pair finally move on with their lives. Noah gets called up to serve his country and Allie completes college. Allie is soon in love with another man and Noah had finally been able to buy the run down hose he showed Allie several years before ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: Intense, romantic and very brilliantly made Disadvantages: Stock up on tissues and waterproof mascara!
...easy number one would remain the legendary The Notebook. I would easily rate this among the greatest, most intense love stories I ever watched in my entire life. The element which touched me the most in this brilliant masterpiece would remain that, in opposition to some classic romances, this one actually ends happily- with Allie and Noah flying together in death, forever united at the end of their lives, just like they had been all throughout. Of ... ...from the very fact that they never mention death at the end of the book. Yet, what I tend to do is try and avoid any comparisons between the book and the movie. Both of them are special and unique in their own manner. Like an avid fan of romantic movies, I completely loved that part about Allie and Noah being separated and finding each other again as adults. I think it takes a great deal of pure, sincere love in order to fall in love with each other ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: A lovely heart warming film Disadvantages: You'll need plenty of tissues
THE NOTEBOOK
INTRODUCTION
'The Notebook' is based on the novel of the same name by Nicholas Sparks. It is a romantic drama set in both the past and present. The film takes place mostly in the 1940's but it fast- forwards about 50 years as the two young lovers find themselves much older and attempting to cope with health problems that have caused the once effervescent young lady to lose most of the memory of her exciting past. The ... ...by Gena Rowlands) The story he is telling is that of their life together. Get the tissues out - it's a weepy. THE STORY
We start the film as Noah reads to Allie, it then moves back to 1940 and a young Noah (Ryan Gosling) and Allie (Rachel McAdams) meet and slowly fall in love. Allison( Allie,) was the beautiful daughter of John and Annie Hamilton (David Thornton, Joan Allen), who lived in a plantation-style mansion just outside of Seabrook ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: Great performances Disadvantages: You'll hate it if you're not a fan of romance
The Notebook is a 2004 film based on the book by Nicholas Sparks. It is a romantic film which is incredibly well presented, and be warned - it may bring a tear to your eye. The film met with mixed reviews, and it is definitely one for those who like a bit of a weepie film. In terms of emotional feeling, I class on the same level as Tuesdays With Morrie, starring Jack Lemmon and Hank Azaria.
The story features an old man reading a story to an old ... ...stories, as he reads it, the scene changes and the film turns into the story, with the excellent Ryan Gosling playing Noah and Rachel McAdams playing Allie in a romance tale from the past. As the film progresses, we see the love of Noah and Allie split apart by other people and war, and with the flashbacks and flashforwards in the film, we see a romance story being pieced together bit by bit.
The story is very emotional. My wife and I watched it ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: good laugh, somthing to kill the day watching from in my bed. Disadvantages: having 30 discs to lookafter..
...I'm a fan of Friends and though 100 pounds is a lot sum of money but I did not hesitate when the necessary amount was finally available.
Well, despite of that I would like to mention several things:
the dvd's are double layer troubled me much more than I had expected
I bought the set just one month ago and the price went down by 30 pounds.
I was expecting bonuses on each disc, but the same bonuses were on all the discs. Friends Only the last disc of the tenth season contained a lot of bonuses that I found interesting.
I have tried to watch the episodes on dvd-player and my laptopdvd-rom - nothing worked. I believe the discs were defective from the very beginning, which was kind of disappointment. But everything else worked fine on my normal dvd player , I could even watch other episodes on the same side of this disc.
But in...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average somewhat helpful
Advantages: Great film, good special features. Disadvantages: Heather
...I watch DVD's on my laptop at home with headphones on. Normally I find this limits my enjoyment, but with Blair Witch it enhanced it. I was scared witless in my pitch black living room, with my headphones on the "witch" seemed to be all around me. This is a truly original piece of cinema, which uses suspense as skillfully as Hitchcock. As enjoyable as it is believable, I found Blair Witch to be one of the best films of the year. The only possible downsides are Heather (watch and you'll find out why - my god that girls annoying) and the fact the paCe sometimes slows a little too much in the daytime. But other than these relatively minor flaws this is a great film
The DVD brings with it several extras, including some beardy blokes telling us about the nature of fear and an excellent deleted scene. It has a fantastic running through...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Advantages: Fantastic performances, particularly Toni Collette and Haley Joel Osment Disadvantages: If someones already ruined it for you
...Sixth sense was the first DVD I ever rented to watch on my laptop at home. I was in a bit of a rush as I had nearly been told the twist so may times I was considering a hermit. But I managed to save myself, and boy was I glad I did, this is one of those films where it wouldn't be the same if you knew it, and being blissfully ignorant certainly does make it a real "must see twice film". The DVD hasd lots of cool special features, a LOT of cut out footage, including a whole scence which appears in the trailer but not the film. My favourite bit is when they go through the clues, to a great twist and you can kick yourself a few hundred times. Why the second best twist....Fight Club...but that's another review...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Based on the celebrated novel by Nicholas Sparks, THE NOTEBOOK tells the story of a young couple who overcome insurmountable odds to experience the true power of love. In a modern-day nursing home, a kindhearted man (James Garner) reads a tender story to another patient (Gena Rowlands). The story begins during one glorious summer in small-town South Carolina in the early 1940s. Noah Calhoun (Ryan Gosling) is a blue-collar log mill worker who courts the wealthy and sheltered Allie Nelson (Rachel McAdams). Before long, sparks are flying and the pair is in love. But eventually Allie's snobby parents force their separation, and when World War II arrives, Noah heads overseas to serve his country. In the meantime, Allie becomes a nurse and falls for another man (James Marsden), to Noah's dismay. Nonetheless, he buys and fixes up the mansion he promised Allie he would one day restore, and when he and Allie reunite just before her wedding, their love blossoms once again. Decades later, in the nursing home, the story reaches its heartfelt conclusion. Directed with extreme sensitivity by Nick Cassavetes (son of co-star Gena Rowlands), THE NOTEBOOK is aided immensely by the naturalistic performances of Gosling and McAdams, whose chemistry is palpable.
Technical information
Special Features: Optional Filmmakers Feature Length Commentaries, 3 Featurettes, Casting, Theatrical Trailer, Limited edition gift set
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