“Endless Love,” a remake of a film based on the novel by Scott Spencer, is the movie that many young girls and couples will flock to this Valentine’s Day season, but don’t expect the blissful love story you see in the film’s trailer.
The story is somewhat typical of a modern day romance; David Elliot (Alex Pettyfer, “Magic Mike”) is a charismatic and polite boy who doesn’t come from much. Jade Butterfield (Gabriella Wilde, “Carrie”) is a beautiful and painfully shy girl from a wealthy family. The movie begins with Butterfield and Elliot graduating high school, and Elliot has had a crush on her since their sophomore year.
Set in Georgia, Butterfield first notices Elliot at The Inn, a fancy restaurant at which the Butterfields dine and where he works as a valet. Elliot invites Jade to come on a joyride with him in one of the diners’ sport cars, and from then the spark is lit.
Butterfield and Elliot start to fall in love very quickly, but not everyone is happy about it. Butterfield’s father Hugh (Bruce Greenwood, “The Place Beyond The Pines”) is at the top of that list. He is extremely protective of her ever since her brother died of cancer, and he wants her to continue with her bright future. Butterfield’s father sees Elliot as an unwanted distraction from Jade’s summer internship with a doctor and her upcoming freshman semester at Brown University.
The storyline for the film is weak, but it is worth seeing this film for the actors’ performances. Greenwood is that entitled father that you love to hate for trying to sabotage his daughter’s newfound love. Greenwood also displays a vulnerability over losing a child that is emotionally jarring. While the film’s trailer gives the expectation of Pettyfer being a cocky bad boy, that is not the story at all. David is someone who grew up unprivileged, but with a lot of love in his life that he shows to the Butterfields, and Pettyfer plays this role with grace. While Pettyfer had the stronger performance, expect to see a lot more of Wilde.
The film does have a few low points. The time moves a bit too quickly for the audience to fully fall in love with David and Jade’s love. With a musical montage showing fast clips of their courtship instead of real dialogue, the viewer does not get to see those full swoon moments from popular Nicholas Sparks love-stories-turned-movies such as “The Notebook” or “Safe Haven.”
Although the film’s plot has its weak points, most will be earnest in trying to fall in love with it. In the film’s trailer, Pettyfer says that love is something you fight for; there are some parts in this film that make the movie worth fighting for. Butterfield’s mother Anne, played by the outstanding Joley Richardson (“The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo”), roots for the young lovers the entire time despite her husband’s harsh reservations. Through their love she rediscovers a love for herself, something that slipped away from her with her deceased son.
Although some may argue that “Endless Love” is a movie that looked better in the trailer, the actors all deliver superb performances to a story told many times before. This film will teach a lesson we do not always take away from romance films: the importance of self-love.
