I Rewatched ‘A Walk To Remember’ As An Adult & I’m Emotionally Traumatised

There’s no movie that can reduce an entire group of grown-ass women to tears like the ’00s classic A Walk To Remember.

Don’t get it twisted, it was one of the first truly great tearjerkers. Two years before Nicholas Sparks tore our hearts to shreds in 2004 movie The Notebook, there was A Walk To Remember with Mandy Moore and Shane West.

The story was nothing groundbreaking. Two teens start out hating each other but eventually fall in love before learning that one is terminally ill. But the chemistry between the two leads was electric. You felt it. Mandy even admitted recently that she fell in love with Shane while filming. SAME GURL.

While I have vague memories of watching this movie as a hazy-eyed teen, I thought it was time to give it another spin. Let’s get into it!

I rewatched A Walk To Remember as an adult and it left me emotionally traumatised:

The movie begins as a group of teens drive up to meet. You can tell they’re the cool kids, ‘cos they’re paired off and making out with each other while leaning on cars. Classic.

I immediately hate one guy who screams in his girlfriend’s face and pushes her. Within seconds they’re kissing again. Super.

A new kid arrives alone and he is clearly ‘not cool’ because he is wearing a baggy striped top which is contrasted with Shane’s character Landon in a skintight black shirt. It’s obvious that Landon is cool. Possibly the coolest in the cool group.

The cool group are making the not cool guy jump from a big tower into what I can assume is a lake. Or is this a sewage plant? It’s all unclear. I guess it’s some kind of initiation. Anyway, he jumps and it’s a big mood.

Me: “Don’t freak out just because that text your friend sent didn’t include an emoji at the end. We’re not fighting. It’s OK. Don’t jump to conclusions.”

Also me:

As he plunges into the water, the cool group laugh at his misfortune. Ah, to be YOUNG and CRUEL. What a time. So after being underwater for a very long time, he floats up and looks very much NOT FUCKING ALIVE.

Landon pulls him out of the water before security rocks up and all the teens just leave this dying guy on the side of the road. This is fine. He eventually regains consciousness and just when Landon is trying to escape he is caught by the police.

Next, we’re at Landon’s house and his mum (umm hello Daryl Hannah) is there and immediately threatens to call his father. “This has got to stop between you and him. You can’t do that. You need a father,” she declares, as some character background is shoved down our throats.

I’ve barely accepted anyone could name their son Landon at this point.

While I recover from the confusion, we’re at church and Mandy Moore (aka Jamie) is in the choir singing like an angel. She is staring intensely at Landon, who is sitting in the audience.

At school as punishment for, you know, nearly killing that guy, the principle tells Landon he has to join the spring play which Jamie is also in. At practice, Jamie stares at Landon…again.

The staring is relentless. Jamie, please!! This is getting disturbing!

SRSLY, MANDY. ARE YOU OK?! You haven’t blinked in five minutes.

I can relate to the girl, tho.

There’s some weird subplot with Landon’s ex GF trying to get back with him, and he tells her “It’s over,” and she replies, “Yeah! Whatever!” IT’S ALL VERY UNNECESSARY.

Back at school, the cool group are being assholes. Jamie arrives and they make fun of her outfit, which tbh is fair as she is dressed like she’s from the 18th century but simultaneously like a giant baby. Later when Landon is catching the bus, Jamie sits beside him and asked if he’s visiting the guy he almost killed in hospital.

He ignores her and listens to Onesidezero. Ah, teenage boys! Aren’t they are real treat?!

At practice for the spring play, Landon rocks up late and is somehow awarded a leading role. UMMM EXCUSE ME?! That does not happen. Here I am practising for months to be a Ronette in Little Shop of Horrors and ended up playing part of the plant’s arm.

Back on subject, and after practice, Jamie notices Landon is waiting out front for a pickup and no one shows. She reads him to filth before he asks for a lift, but later tells him she’s only being nice to him because on her bucket list she had “to befriend someone you don’t like.”

As Landon struggles with his lines, he asks Jamie for help and she says she will under one condition: “You have to promise you won’t fall in love with me,” she tells him.

Like me, she failed to read the room:

WHATEVER YOU SAY MUSTAFA! I think we shared a very special moment when I messaged you to get off the freeway and guided you to safety but whatever.

Back on topic, Landon spots Jamie wandering around in a cemetery. The girl has issues. He stops to ask her what she’s doing and turns out she is err… using a homemade telescope.

She talks about boring space stuff and he quips “Ah, nature’s miracles!” Ngl, it’s pretty funny.

Back at school, Landon blanks Jamie in front of his friends. He then rocks up at her house and she closes the door in his face. It’s great. She says she thought she saw something good in him but was wrong. SAVAGE.

After realising he’s kind of a piece of trash, Landon FINALLY goes to the hospital and visits the guy he almost killed, who seems pretty chill about it all.

It’s spring play time! For some reason, Jamie rocks up to set dressed like she’s going to throw a ring into Mordor. But the cape was just prepping for the mightiest of glow ups.

BREAKING NEWS: Jamie is hot.

She sings ‘Only Hope’ and it’s magical. Landon is mesmerised by her and he is totally falling in love. He kissed her and I don’t think that was in the script???? She seems shook. I am too. Landon’s dad rocks up to the play but gets shut down.

Back at school, Landon is no longer popular and he sits with Jamie at lunch. He tries to talk to her and she sips from a juice box like she’s five years old and it’s disturbing.

He says he wants to spend more time with her but Jamie says, “It sounds like bull!” and storms off. OK, BITCH. I don’t know what her deal is right now.

Later at school, the popular group photoshop a pic of Jamie into a weird lingerie image. It doesn’t look remotely real but all the school kids laugh at it. Ummmm cos it’s such a bad photoshop job????

While the poster was split in the movie, I’ve joined it together so we can appreciate it in all its glory.

Jamie runs out of the cafeteria (offended by just how shitty the edit job was I assume??) and Landon takes her home. He asks if she can go out with him but she says she’s not allowed to date. But he gets the OK from her dad which was surprisingly easy.

They go to a restaurant and have a vague boring talk about the future. Sorry fans but I’ve got to say Jamie is fucking dull at times. Landon tries to liven things up as he drives her to an abandoned intersection and informs her she’s “straddling the state line” so, therefore, is in two places at once, which is on her bucket list.

Later he ticks off another bucket item as he applies a fake tattoo to her back. It’s actually stunning.

They eventually kiss outside her house and Landon tells Jamie he loves her. IT’S ONLY THEIR FIRST DATE. She falls silent. Same.

Her dad rocks up and totally cockblocks her. Landon leaves. She tells her dad that she loves Landon and he replies, “Then be fair to him, Jamie, before things get worse.”

INTRIGUING. The couple then go on their second date to watch the solar system or some bullshit.

Landon asks Jamie to find a specific star, before he tells her he named it after her. THIS GUY IS TOO MUCH.

The star crap works a treat. Jamie tells Landon she loves him too and that her life goal is to marry in the same church her parents got hitched. Landon also starts thinking about his dreams and tells his mum he wants to go to medical school because Jamie has inspired him.

Just when things are going far too cruisey, Jamie tells Landon: “I’m sick.” He doesn’t understand and she elaborates, revealing “I have leukaemia,” then adding that she is no longer responding to treatment.

IT’S A PUNCH TO THE HEART. I CAN’T TAKE IT.

Landon drives around crying as ‘Dare You To Move’ by Switchfoot plays, as was the norm for all  ‘00s movies and TV shows. He then barges in on his dad, who we quickly gather is a doctor. He tells his father that Jamie has cancer and he needs him to fix her right this second, like he could wave a magic cancer wand.

LANDON DEFS NEEDS TO GO TO MEDICAL SCHOOL, HUH.

Eventually, Landon and Jamie reunite and she tells him “I’m scared of not being with you.” I’m actually broken inside at this point. Later on, Jamie collapses and is taken to hospital.

Landon finds out that his dad is paying for Jamie to get treatment at home. He visits him and they hug and I can’t keep typing rn because my keyboard is getting too wet.

Landon proposes and they get married in her parents’ church. Landon says in a voiceover that after a summer together, Jamie died.

IT HURTS. SOMEBODY SEDATE ME.

Four years pass and Landon returns to visit Jamie’s dad. He tells him he’s been at medical school before telling her father, “Sorry, she never got her miracle.”

The dad replies: “She did, it was you.”

WHY DON’T YOU JUST RIP MY WHOLE HEART OUT. I’M NOT USING IT ANYMORE.

This movie has legit destroyed my mind, body and soul.

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A Walk to Remember is available to stream on Netflix.