We all remember “The Notebook” and the love story brought to life by novel writer Nicholas Sparks. Sorry to say that this novel could not translate on the big screen for many factors, but we will get to that later. “Dear John” follows the life of two lovers who have a chance encounter resulting in love after two weeks. Channing Tatum is John a soldier who is on a short leave from base and Amanda Seyfried as Savannah, a college student who seems to have a heart of gold. The pair immediately has a connection and spends the next two weeks together, basically inseparable. That is until it is time for John to return to base. Promising each other that they will make this relationship work and want to discover everything they can about each other they begin writing. Letters continuously flow back and forth until finally a year later it is almost time for John to return home from his time served to his country.

That is until fate sends him a blow known as 9/11. That day changed everything in the military and when John’s group wants to serve another term he feels required to do so as well. First he gets to return home and reunite with Savannah. The two are quickly back in each other’s arms and her hopes of their future are quickly dashed when she discovers John is returning to base for another term. Initially displeased with his decision, John makes Savannah understand his desire to do this.

Separated once again only causes more strain on their relationship. John continues writing Savannah but soon finds her letters are fewer and far between, until that final letter comes. Savannah apologizes and tells John that she can no longer be him and her reasons why are shocking.

“Dear John” did not work for many reasons, the first being our lead actress. Amanda Seyfried was wonderful in “Mama Mia”, but she could not take on this big of a role convincingly and I found her very unrelatable, a huge difference from Rachel McAdams in “The Notebook”. It was unbelievable to me that this couple had the chemistry that would survive two wars and I had no emotional connection with either character. The most emotions engaged from me were from John’s relationship with his father (Richard Jenkins). As I did not read the novel I can only take it from other reader’s opinions that the movie did not follow the novel and they were disappointed. There were some rather strange occurrences towards the end that made me dislike this film that much more. Channing Tatum did offer a valiant performance that was enjoyed and he will have ladies swooning everywhere, but not even he could save this disappointing love story. “Dear John” please take notes on what a real love story is all about, because I was not feeling this one at all.