Directed by: George Tillman Jr.
Written by: Nicholas Sparks (novel), Craig Bolotin (screenplay)
Starring: Britt Robertson, Scott Eastwood, Alan Alda, Jack Huston
Take one pint-sized actress and mix in hunky male (piercing blue eyes optional). Add geographic distance/serious illness/drastically opposed lifestyles, or all three. Scatter clichés generously. Take care not to introduce subtlety.
Another cookie-cutter Nicholas Sparks adaptation emerges undercooked, seemingly without undergoing redrafts or second takes. Even Robertson looks insincere at times, and no wonder. Not content with bearing no relation to reality, The Longest Ride produces an offensively convenient happy ending which counters its “message” that “love requires sacrifice.”
Alda somehow sells both the cantankerousness and anguish of his plot-device character, but nothing else surprises.
Must we really go through all this again?!
Allergy information: do not consume if intolerant of weepy melodrama, (East)wooden acting, or poor plotting. Contains empty calories and no cine-nutritional value. Cannot guarantee tear free.
SCENE A LOT OF FILMS 