The Choice

Romance films typically come in two main formats: either in a comedic or dramatic form. Both formats are again, typically predictable and formulaic in nature, which can leave them uninteresting and trite. Of all writers, in which dramatic romance films are based, that is undoubtedly the king is that of Nicholas Sparks. Most of his films where the film is based on his novels are usually done fairly well, however when it comes to "The Choice", this is certainly not the case.

In this romantic drama, medical student Gabby Holland (Teresa Palmer) moves next door to a charming womanizer named Travis Parker (Benjamin Walker) in a small North Carolina coastal town. Although Gabby has a serious boyfriend, Dr. Ryan McCarthy (Tom Welling), she and Travis quickly develop feelings for each other. In starting to know one another, they definitely get off to a bad start, but then the relationship eventually blossoms into love. Over the course of a decade, their relationship faces ups and downs as they attempt to decide what they want out of life and what is truly important to them.

Others to round out the cast are Maggie Grace as Stephanie Parker, Travis' sister, Alexandra Daddario as Monica, an old girlfriend of Travis', Tom Wilkinson as Dr. Shep Parker, Travis' father, Jesse C. Boyd as Matt, Brad James as Ben, Noree Victoria as Liz, Anna Enger as Megan, Brett Rice as Dr. McCarthy, Ryan's father, Ashley LeConte Campbell as Maryanne McCarthy, Ryan's mother and Sharon Blackwood as Cora.

This was adequately directed by Ross Katz ("Taking Chance" (TV movie) '09, "Adult Beginners" '14). This filmmaker's ability to make sure his actors are staged properly and the pacing being accurate is basically 'clinical' and whereas his direction is appropriate, it's done in a very safe approach. Certainly this guy doesn't have a ton of theatrical film experience, so I can appreciate his safe approach. Given more experience will allow this guy to loosen up a bit more so one can truly see what this guy's about--filmmaker wise. It is written by Bryan Sipe based on a novel by Nicholas Sparks. Certainly this writer has more experience than that of Katz, but this definitely doesn't give this guy any credit. With most films based on a Sparks novel, there has been an interesting twist or uniqueness to the premise in which to give its audience something more to chew on, however with this storyline, it's just basically your typical boy meets girl, girl meets boy, they have issues in getting to know one another, then they get through them and live happily ever after. I kept waiting for any uniqueness to story to unfold from beginning to about half way through, and then came to the realization that it wasn't going to happen. Once about two-thirds of the film played out, it got interesting, but it took way too long for this to happen. To give the writer some credit, maybe Sparks had an off time in producing a novel that still needed work, however odds would be against this way of thinking since his novels traditionally have an interesting premise given the genre.

This wasn't a bad film, it just wasn't a great one. It was a bit disappointing considering most of films based on a Sparks novel translate well to the big screen. As was mentioned prior, the last one-third of the film definitely had that Sparks stamp of approval, but why did this take so long in getting there?

Out of 4 Stars: 2                                  Rated: PG-13                               111mins.