BEFORE: I'm finally hitting the home stretch of the romance chain - 3 films with Diane Lane, and then it's on to other topics. Spring is right around the corner, as is "Captain Marvel" and the next "Avengers" movie after that.
One of the ways that I've kept myself sane over the course of this romance chain has been by catching up on the IFC show "Documentary Now!", which is also available on Netflix. As a man who's also watched his share of documentaries, it's great to see someone, Bill Hader and Fred Armisen mostly, spoofing the whole genre. They started out with parodies of classic docs like "Nanook of the North" and "Grey Gardens", then they ended Season 1 with a two-part fake rockumentary about a fictitious 70's band called The Blue Jean Committee, which was like a thinly-veiled "History of the Eagles".
In season 2 their episodes spoofed docs like "The War Room" and "Jiro Dreams of Sushi", then totally skewered Spalding Gray's monologue performance in "Swimming to Cambodia", then a completely wonderful take on the Talking Heads' concert film "Stop Making Sense". Finally I just watched the two-part spoof of "The Kid Stays in the Picture", and now I can't wait to catch up with Season 3, which I can record on my DVR. Clearly, past episodes on Netflix are a gateway drug.
James Franco carries over from "I Am Michael" - technically uncredited, but the IMDB and Wikipedia list his role, and I know I saw him in the film as I was dubbing it to DVD.
THE PLOT: A doctor, who is traveling to see his estranged son, sparks with an unhappily married woman at a North Carolina inn.
AFTER: This is the kind of romance film that female movie fans probably really go for - it's got the dissatisfied married woman, the tortured doctor in from out of town, and fate throws them together in a beach house (she's running the inn while her best friend is in Florida, getting her groove back) where he's the only guest (it's off-season, and the reason he's in town is a whole other story...). Plus it's hurricane season, and there's one headed for the Outer Banks. It's going to get stormy, both inside and outside, if you catch my drift.
Adrienne's kids are off with their father - the couple is separated, and her husband wants to reconcile, but she's not ready to forgive him (he knows what he did...) and let him back into her life. Paul is a doctor consumed by guilt after a patient died during an operation, and he's come to the area to apologize to the patient's family, even though his lawyer advised him not to. Two broken people, can they learn to forgive themselves and be healed by the possibility of a new love? BLECH, it's not possible to write about this plot without it sounding really corny. Which, of course, it is. The hurricane strikes JUST as they fall into each other's arms, or is it the other way around? That's also pretty corny, and cheap symbolism to boot.
But there are also long walks on the beach, wild horses running around the island, and nightly crab boils down by the pier. Plenty of good imagery, good music, good-looking food. Paul's stay on the Outer Banks is only temporary, though, he's got to go visit his son, who's also a doctor, at some clinic down in Central or South America. It's terrible that he has to leave, since he just got this new romance started in North Carolina, but the two strike up a correspondence and discuss those title Nights in Rodanthe, and plan for the future. (no spoilers)
But let's talk about the B&B - which isn't just near the beach, it's ON the beach. Like the whole house is up on stilts in the sand, and during high tide there's water under the house. This just can't be practical, right? I was willing to bet this was a prop house built for the film, but no, it was real. However, since the film shoot it was damaged by a real hurricane, and moved to a different location, further from the tide. The interiors were clearly shot in a studio, but reportedly they've decorated the house to match the movie set, so life imitates art for people looking to spend a few nights inside a famous movie house.
The film is based on a novel written by Nicholas Sparks, who also wrote "The Notebook", "Dear John", "Message in a Bottle", and a few others that were adapted into films I haven't seen yet. So be warned, have some Kleenex handy, and be ready to feel all the feels.
I'd love to visit North Carolina someday, my sister lives there (inland) but also spends time on the coast of South Carolina. Me, I'm not really a beach guy - I just don't get the appeal of sandy feet, getting sunburned and potentially drowning - but I know there's some great BBQ in the Carolinas. For our next BBQ Crawl I'd love to head back to New Orleans and take 5 days to drive through Atlanta and up into the Carolinas to sample the different BBQ styles. Oh, yeah, and visit my sister too, I guess.
Also starring Diane Lane (last seen in "Justice League"), Richard Gere (last seen in "Time Out of Mind"), Viola Davis (last seen in "Eat Pray Love"), Scott Glenn (last seen in "Nashville"), Christopher Meloni (last seen in "They Came Together"), Pablo Schreiber (last seen in "13 Hours"), Mae Whitman (last seen in "The Perks of Being a Wallflower"), Charlie Tahan (last seen in "Blue Jasmine"), Becky Ann Baker (last seen in "Table 19"), Carolyn McCormick (last seen in "The Post"), Ted Manson, Ato Essandoh (last seen in "Wish I Was Here").
RATING: 5 out of 10 pieces of outsider art
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