Dear John – DVD Review

The Film:

In this day and age, do real life Dear John Letters still exist? With the advent of emails and text messaging, I suppose women who are tired of their absent boyfriends and/or husbands have a far more crueler tools to use. Coined during WWII, the soldiers quickly identified these letters of wives or girlfriends who are tired of waiting for them, as Dear John Letters, these letters sting. I can’t imagine those brave boys would think of worse things than being in a far-away land, only to get notified their seemingly love has found someone new, let alone fighting Hitler, but alas, technology has brought us the Dear John texts and its evil brother, the Dear John Facebook message.

Can you tell I’ve been stung by this all before? Toilets, sex solicitors, and break-up letters. I hate my name.

Regardless, the origins of the Dear John Letters would be appropriate for a film based on this idea, and with dripping sappiness, here’s Dear John, based on the bestselling tearjerker by Nicholas Sparks. Has anyone in the romantic genre carved out a niche as has Nicholas Sparks in this genre? His name has instant positive associative values, the box office loves him, and women swoon over his next novel. But novels are novels, and film is a different medium, as recent Nicholas Sparks books-turned-films have been rather ho-hum. Maybe something is lost in translation, but these films are feeling rather pedestrian and conventional.

Formula is good, but with a solid cast and director in Lasse Hallstrom (Chocolat, Cider House Rules), there’s something a bit dispassionate in Dear John. Hallstrom delivers a warm film, filled with great cinematography and glow, but the real culprit of the film is the lead love affair between John (Channing Tatum) and Savannah (Amanda Seyfried). The acting and chemistry is fine, but the script doesn’t allow much more passed superficiality of their romance to really develop this inevitable Dear John Letter. John’s relationships with his father (Richard Jenkins, The Visitor) and Tim (Henry Thomas, E.T.) are far more real and warm, despite the brevity. I know that some elements have been changed from the book to this film, such things happen due to streamlining a coherent film, but I felt for John, as he had to deal with such a flip-flopping Savannah. Ugh, I hate girls like her. If she really did love him, and understand America’s climate for soldiers during 9/11, would she really just fling over for Tim?

Dear John isn’t bad, in fact, I found this adaptation emotional better than the Nicholas Sparks wanna-be, The Time Traveler’s Wife, but a good opportunity was missed. Savannah was just too cold and flaky for the audience to really get behind their long, sweeping love affair. I also felt as if the ending or denouement was a cop-out, hastily written, but looking around the theater, seeing not a dry eye amongst many, what do I know?

The DVD:

Audio/Video: As far as DVDs goes, Sony’s release here is pretty good. Colors are warm, with a lot of daylight scenes, that make everything seems colorful. Transfer is detailed and sharp, as a SD transfer can be. The DD 5.1 track is okay for a drama. Rear speakers get plenty of noises, but everything just feels “there”. Not in a bad way, but in a more flat way. Still, all in all, it’s really decent.

A Conversation with Channing, Amanda and Lasse: A short quick interview with the ones in the title that isn’t too bad, just short. Runs about 6 minutes.

Transforming Charleston: This fifteen minute piece is really good. It focuses on the production design side of things and offers up some neat behind-the-scenes footage and interviews with the Production Designer Kara Lindstrom.

Military in Movies: Dear John’s Military Advisors: Capt. Gavin McCulley was the film’s military advisor and he offers up what he liked about the script and what he brought to the characters during the soldier sequences.

The Story of Braeden Reed: The disc’s best extra, focuses not on the film per se, but on the young boy who played Alan. This 25 minute piece talks about his life with autism and is really quite touching. A must see.

Outtakes, some ho-hum Deleted Scenes and a different Alternate Ending that ends a little better than the one used, plus Trailers rounds out the extras.

Conclusion: An okay romantic film, although nowhere near The Notebook’s level is on a great DVD release.

The Film: Rating:

The DVD: Rating: