You would think that the tenth Nicholas Sparks book to be adapted into film would be a showstopper. It's a momentous occasion as an author. Instead The Longest Ride trends towards the same problems plaguing his other films "“ I only like half the story, and the entire plot is extremely predictable. Art student and perfectionist Sophia, is dragged to a local rodeo and hits it off with world-renowned bull rider Luke. After the couple's first date, they happen on Ira's car wreck and save him. Their love is interrupted by forces beyond their control (graduation, medical ailments, quest for the international bull riding championship"¦). I'm trying to keep my gag reflex in check. SPOILER: Their love conquers all, and they live happily ever after. This is a Nicholas Sparks book after all.
Perhaps the best part of this film is the storyline following Ira and Ruth Levinson. It is told in a series of flashbacks narrated by Alan Alda, who plays elder Ira. The story is compelling and fraught with legitimate struggle, not the modern day equivalent to quarter life crises from our beloved Luke and Sophia. Ira was sent to fight in WWII, leaving Ruth behind to wait and pray for his safe return. After being injured and running a very high fever due to infection, Ira is sent home. But not all is happiness and flowers"¦ The couple must learn to adapt from consequences of his injury and fever. The couple learns to sacrifice with compromises, and love despite all. The modern story between Luke and Sophia, the purported main characters, pales in comparison. I would ask why the story couldn't just focus on Ira and Ruth, but that probably wouldn't have sold enough books and thus been made into a movie. Yep, I'm a cynic.
The soundtrack and score actually fit in nicely with the story. It had just the right amount of southern sass coupled with the sounds of the "˜40s, "˜50s and "˜60s to supplement the Levinson flashbacks. I'm glad to see that Alan Alda still has that mischievousness to him that made his M*A*S*H character so lovable. Despite the capable performances from Scott Eastwood and Britt Robertson, Alda definitely stole the show.
Is The Longest Ride completely unbearable? No. I've sat through worse. But I'm also tired of Sparks' films having the same tired scenes and plots. Falling water make-out scene? Check. Making out in a lake? Check. A more interesting secondary character than the primary? Check.
