(C) Click here to watch a preview. Dear John answers a question many of us have asked: can Channing Tatum read and write? It seems he can. He reads and writes a lot of letters in this movie, although they are brief and full of simple words. Seriously, both Channing Tatum and Amanda Seyfried demonstrate some very good acting chops in this chick flick, and Tatum gets a chance to show a lot more depth than in his previous movies. Dear John is corny and a little slow-moving, but if you liked The Notebook, you will like this one. If you go, get ready to be blinded by the light of 300 teenage girls texting on their iPhones, Blackberrys, and Droids. This movie pulls a very skewed demographic.
John Tyree (Tatum) is an Army Special Forces tough guy who learned to talk by watching Gary Cooper movies (”Yep,” “Nope, “Yes sir,” “No ma’am”). Savannah Curtis (Seyfried) is the whitest girl since Jan Brady, and she doesn’t smoke, drink, or sleep-around, although she does admit to “cussing in her head.” John and Savannah meet on the beach in the summer of 2001 when she’s on break from college and he’s on leave from the military. Her parents are wealthy and seem to be only a generation removed from owning plantations and buying slaves. His single dad (Richard Jenkins) is autistic and spends most of his time cooking lasagna and studying his extensive coin collection. Read the Rest of This Review »