by Laina Vitarelli, entertainment editor
Based on the novel by Nicholas Sparks and directed by Michael Hoffman,The Best of Me is a heart-felt romance filled with all the good stuff and abundant with love, fate, bonds, and dreams.
Dawson Cole (played by James Marsden and Luke Bracey) and Amanda Collier (played by Michelle Monaghan and Liana Liberato), the main characters, are seen as both the younger and older versions of themselves throughout the movie. The film goes back and forth between present and past showing how their love formed, stopped, and started again.
“I loved Dawson and Amanda. I feel like the way they acted when they were together is what people dream of. They were so romantic and in love, it was great,” senior Kaitlyn Mckenna said.
Nicholas Sparks is known for his novels because they always seem to bring people to the brink of their emotions, and this film was no different than his novel, or any of his other works.
There is an air of sadness that hangs throughout the entire movie. When things seem to be working out between Dawson and Amanda there is always someone preventing that, be it an outsider or themselves.
The man that brought them together over and over again was Tuck (played by Gerald McRaney), who took teenage Dawson in when he had nowhere else to go. Loyalty was a key theme and the relationship between Tuck and Dawson was a strong one. They both had no one else to rely on and formed a bond parallel to that of a father and a son.
“The movie was actually really good. I hadn’t thought I was going to like it but I did. My favorite character was probably Tuck because he was one really tough old man,” movie-goer Mert Avcu said.
During the course of the film it becomes known that sometimes blood relation doesn’t mean there is any sort of love. Dawson comes from a family of bad men who abused him all throughout his childhood. But Amanda’s family cares too much about her future and not her happiness. A key element presented in this movie is what it means to be a good family.
Overall it was a touching drama and romance that is recommend to all. Everyone needs a good love story once in a while.
![“I agree the school lost its purpose, I left newspaper because I no longer had an interest and passion that I did once believe I had, the school’s more worried about student law court then what’s in the name in the school. [Which is journalism],” senior Christos Troumhis said. Photo attributions to Jon S.](https://wjpsnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/6276688407_12900948a2_z.jpg)
