The film shifts from the past, to the present 60 years later). Alison Hamilton or Allie (Rachel McAdams) at 17 falls head over heels and passionately in love with 19 year-old Noah Calhoun (Ryan Gosling). He is a motherless child, raised by his father, working class through and through, employed in the local timber mill. Noah likes the poetry of Walt Whitman, and knows what he wants.
When that becomes Allie, and she keeps saying “No”, he won’t listen to her. He indulges in daring acts to win her attention. She comes from the other side of the tracks, is destined to go to Sarah Lawrence College (then the most elite women’s college in the US) when summer ends, but is bored in the country on holiday with her parents, so succumbs to Noah’s attention. First love overwhelms them both, and Nick Cassavetes captures their rapture, their delirium, beautifully.
Old love is restrained, even distant, as Allie (in old age acted by Gena Rowlands) has developed dementia and cannot remember anything, either from the past, or recent events. An old man called Duke (James Garner) reads to her in spurts from her notebook in which she had recorded her love affair with Noah. This becomes the vehicle for all the flashbacks showing what had happened through the decade of the 1940s.
Her family did intervene and tried to kill what they thought was a passing infatuation. Noah wrote 365 letters that Allie never received, and Allie yearned for him for seven years. They both tried to resume normal lives, but could they? Their theme song was “I’ll be seeing you in all the familiar places”.
This film is very much a family affair as Gena Rowlands was married to John Cassavetes until he died in 1989. She is Nick, the director’s mother. Though long gone, the hand of the father is present in The Notebook. John made 11 independent films during his lifetime and to survive acted in many others. His life was a struggle for acceptance and against alcohol. Hollywood was a demon and he would not knuckle under it.
His films had a political, social and psychological depth missing in most American movies. They were badly reviewed. At times to raise the money to make a film, he and Gena had to mortgage their house. He brought the French “new wave” to America. Though he did garner three Oscar nominations as “Best Director” and was thus recognised, Cassavetes never received a mass following. They were considered “art” films, and relegated to the sideline.
When, after years of work he released his first film Shadows (1959), it was received well at Venice and in the UK. First Europe, then Americans began to appreciate Cassavetes. Still, when A Woman Under the Influence (1974) was ready, he had to distribute it himself.
Only after both he and Gena received Academy Award nominations did the establishment begin to take notice. It is fitting that Criterion has just released a boxed set of five DVDs of John Cassavetes’s films. And that his son’s new film has so far grossed P400 million.
The Notebook was filmed in Georgetown, South Carolina and Montreal, Canada. It is two hours long. It is rated “10” though be cautioned there are scenes of rascality, love and with language. It is from the bestselling novel by Nicholas Sparks; script by Jeremy Leven; adapted by Jan Sardi. The cinematographer is Robert Fraisse; editor Alan Heim; and orchestration is by Aaron Zigman.
