not since "Titanic"...

Rating: Null/10 (24 July 2004)

...have I seen or heard so many people bawl in the last 20 minutes of a movie. When the credits rolled for this movie, all that was heard over the soft music was sniffling, including my own. This movie is certainly a tearjerker, mostly due to the performances of James Garner and Gena Rowlands. If the film were just about young Noah and Allie falling in love, it would seem ho-hum and contrived. It's not, though. It doesn't end with them finally getting together.
***SPOILERS HEREIN*** Instead, like the book on which it is based, it ends with a very poignant look at Noah and Allie forty-some years later, when they are both elderly and ill. The pain that Garner's character feels over his "sweetheart's" Alzheimer's is apparent without being hurled at us. We watch him watching her deteriorate, which is hard to do, but you can't stop watching it because he is so in love with her that it is compelling while at the same time tragic. The book ends very differently than the movie, and doesn't give away who Allie chose until the very end, when you realize that the older couple and the younger couple are the same. Still, the ending of the film, while different than the book, is very powerful and is a slightly fantasized version of how strong the bond between spouses can be. Who cares if this sort of thing doesn't happen often, if at all, in real life? When Rowlands looks out at a sunset and says "I've never seen anything more beautiful" and Garner, looking at her, says "Neither have I," don't we all long for someone to feel that way about us? The film has its funny points too, especially between the younger couple ("Woman, you kill me!"), which breaks up the tears nicely. This is a good thing, or else I doubt I would have made it through this one. Good performances and writing all around-great movie for couples in all stages of love.