A Walk To Remember: Love Tips from Jamie

MEDIA MONDAY

Warner Bros. 

In 2002, A Walk to Remember came out, starring Mandy Moore and Shane West, based on the romance novel by Nicolas Sparks, the author of The Notebook and Dear John. Though it made its debut in 2002, I didn't see this film until last month. Having seen it now, I can say that Jamie (Mandy Moore) has a lot of characteristics that many teenagers today no longer possess, or even want to possess. 

Warner Bros. 

Meet Landon. He's your regular movie bad boy. The guy that has to participate in school play and carry out janitorial duties because he's that close to expulsion. This is when he asks Jamie for help learning his lines because he doesn't want to make a fool of himself onstage.

Meet Jamie. A kindhearted, not very popular, intelligent girl, who agrees to help Landon learn his lines. They genuinely begin to get along as they practice after school. But, once she approaches in the hallway, he treats her coldly in front of all of his friends. Typical.

At first, this seems like your typical High School Musical kind of movie. Or Step Up. Or any of the other movies where the popular guy gets the geeky girl, usually AFTER she has an insane makeover. Don't even get me started on Grease. That's a whole other Media Monday waiting to happen.

A Walk to Remember seems typical, except for the character of Jamie. Here's why:

1. She doesn't try to change him. Ever. She doesn't try to stop Landon from hanging out with his friends. She doesn't ask him to stop cursing because she comes from a religious background. She doesn't try to make him more ambitious. And does he change by the end anyway? Yes. Why is that? Because he came up with the idea to alter his worse qualities on his own. And even if he hadn't, Jamie would have been okay with it because she made it clear how she should be treated.

2. She never allows him to disrespect her. In her quiet, peaceful way, Jamie does not let Landon cross the line in how he treats her. The day she approached him in school, and he cast her off in front of his friends was a key moment of disrespect. When Landon showed up to her house later for scene practice, she refused to help him. This wasn't out of malice or hostility. It was Jamie's rightful way of standing up for herself.

3. She is not a manipulator. A lot of teenagers we watch in movies and television are always trying to manipulate guys into liking them. Jamie is not like that. Sure, Landon bought her a present as an apology, but not because she manipulated him into feeling that way. After letting him know that it is not appropriate to disrespect her, she would have been happy either way, whether he got her a present or just left her alone for the rest of high school.

4. She has got her own thing going on. She sings and acts in the school play. She participates in choir. Jamie has her own interests and absolutely does not care what anyone else thinks about them. She doesn't sit at home and pine for Landon to come to her door. She doesn't blabber on the phone with her girlfriends about how cute he is. She has her own, separate life going on apart from him--and she's living it. She'd be happy whether he was a part of her life or not.

4. She goes with the flow. Notice how I keep writing variations of, "Jamie would have been happy either way." That's the main lesson we should pull from this character. Whether the guy likes you or not, life goes on, and a crush should never be the center of it.

As you can tell, I loved this movie. Totally recommended.

For those of you who've seen it, what do you think?

Love,

~Zabrinah