A Walk to Remember --- A review

Starring Shane West as Landon Carter, and singer Mandy Moore as Jamie Sullivan,
the film is based on the 1999 teenage romantic novel 'A Walk to Remember' by Nicholas
Sparks. The teen romantic drama revolves around the two, who are attending the final year of
high school.
Landon Carter is portrayed as the typical, rebellious and popular teenager of the 90s.
He faces himself in a situation where he has to choose between expulsion from school or
making up for his actions by tutoring little kids and playing a role in the school play, after
being caught on grounds of under-age drinking and involvement in a dangerous prank against
a fellow student. Jamie Sullivan is the local minister's daughter and has been studying with
Landon since kindergarten. She is very unpopular among others, though she is extremely
kind and helpful, due to her old-fashioned ways of dressing and her habit of carrying a bible
with her. She plays the female lead in the school play.
When Landon has trouble memorizing the lines, he seeks the help of Jamie. She agree
to do it on one condition, which is not to fall in love with her. They start practising together
every day. On the night of the play, Jamie astounds Landon and the entire audience with her
beauty and her voice. Onstage at the ending to the play, Jamie sings. When Jamie finishes,
Landon kisses her which is not part of the play.
After this incident Jamie avoids Landon, and it is not before Landon supports her after
a cruel prank by his friends, that they become friends again. One day, Landon asks Jamie's
dad for his permission to take her on a date, as she would not come without his permission.
As days pass, he tells Jamie that he is in love with him. But Jamie starts crying and reveals to
Landon, that she had leukemia and that she's dying. A desperate Landon asks for his father's
help in curing her, but is disappointed by his reply and heads home thinking about Jamie.
When Jamie's condition gets worse, she is admitted to a hospital. Unbeknownst to Landon,
his father pays for Jamie's private home care, which makes Landon reunite with his father
tearfully. Landon starts making her wishes come true. Jamie's father begins to like him for his
love for Jamie.
Finally, Landon asks Jamie to marry him, which she agrees to, and they marry in a
formal ceremony, with all their friends and family present. Later that end of summer, Jamie
dies. After four years, Landon still loves Jamie and wears their wedding ring. Landon visits
Reverend Sullivan to return to him Jamies precious book that belonged to her mother.
Landon apologizes to the Reverend that Jamie did not witness a miracle (an ambition she
expressed in the class yearbook). The Reverend disagrees saying that in fact she did and that
her miracle was Landon. He is shown to have completely changed his original opinion of
Landon in the beginning of the film, where he completely detested Landon and did not hide
it. The film ends with Landon's thoughts that 'love is like the wind; you can't see it, but you
can feel it'.

Though the storyline, based on the novel, is exceptionally good, the director Adam
Shankman fails to bring out the film as an interesting one. A lot of changes have been done to
the story making it different from the book at many instances, for the sake of time limit. The
roles have been played perfectly by the actors. You'd feel that the movie is yet another
romantic drama, slow and uninteresting, for the major part of the time. The movie doesn't get
emotional (wherein emotion is the main highlight of the book), till the last 20 minutes. You
may have tears in your eyes when Landon and his father reunite, or during the display of true
love between Landon and Jamie, after he gets to know of her disease. And you'll surely love
those few minutes, which gives you a bit of relief that you didn't waste 100 minutes,
watching this film.
Thus, this movie, yet again proves that a movie is not as good as its book. It turns out
to be really disappointing for those who loved the novel. But on the whole, the story makes
you feel good and has the potential to cause a change in you.
A Walk to Remember ---- a beautiful love story and a movie to watch once.