The movie Callum Turner is obsessed with: “So good for so many different reasons”
Callum Turner is the sort of actor who doesn’t give the game away too easily.
One minute he’s in the thick of a gritty drama, the next he’s holding his own in a big studio epic – and no matter the project, there’s a kind of simmering focus that runs through everything he does. It’s probably why his name keeps cropping up in James Bond conversations.
As his career picks up pace and more people start taking notice of his work, it’s clear Turner’s not just phoning it in. He’s got solid taste, and the films he gravitates towards say a lot about what he’s chasing as an actor.
Turner, it would appear, doesn’t tend to go for the loudest titles in the room. In fact, one of the films he’s grown to love often gets shrugged off, even though it absolutely cleaned up at the box office, struck a chord with loads of people, and established itself as a cultural touchstone.
The Notebook is one of those films, like Titanic, that is often mocked or brushed off for being a romance drama or ‘chick flick’, and just like Titanic, this happened despite the film’s success.
It might have been more of a sleeper hit than James Cameron’s masterpiece, but it’s undoubtedly a household name and cult classic that launched the career of one of the world’s most sought-after leading men, and now, finally, someone is actually putting some respect on its name.
Callum Turner, the current favourite for the next James Bond, spoke to Hero Magazine about his love for the film. “I love The Notebook, it’s so good for so many different reasons,” he explained for their Endorsed series, which sees artists discuss their favourites.
While for some, The Notebook is a cheesy, overly sentimental romance, for Turner, it’s following in the footsteps of the legendary John Cassavetes, for after all, the film was directed by Cassavetes son, Nick, so it’s not a massive leap to take, even though many might struggle to see the line between The Notebook and the likes of A Woman Under the Influence.
Not Turner, though, who sees it quite clearly, further explaining, “It’s born out of Cassavete’s ideology of acting, who is the godfather of indie film… He was also an actor, and Gena Rowlands was his wife, who was in all his films.” For Cassavetes, the actor was the heart of the film, and his actors carried the movies.
After all, it is the great Gena Rowlands, specifically her performance in A Woman Under The Influence, that is cited by most actors as inspiration, and interestingly, it is the performances of Amy McAdams and Ryan Gosling that carry The Notebook, such that, while many criticised its writing, most praised the work of the actors, and Turner couldn’t agree more, noting, “They’re both incredible in that film”. As previously mentioned, regardless of whatever other opinion people have of the film, it launched Gosling into stardom, and honestly, he is one leading man who really deserves it.
You might not agree with every film choice he’s made, but there’s no doubting that the man can act, and, in my opinion, can totally save a rather dull film (looking at you Barbie, sorry!), plus we’ve yet to even mention the chemistry between Gosling and McAdams, which makes some of the heavy-handed sentimentality totally believable.
For Turner, much of the positives of The Notebook are born out of the link to John Cassavetes, “It’s born out of that world”, and besides the acting and direction of Nick Cassavetes, there’s one major throughline between him and his father in the movie, wherein he also cast Gena Rowlands, his mother, in the film. She delivers a heartbreaking performance as the elderly version of Adams’ protagonist, Allie, which is even more heartbreaking considering the very real love story of her and John Cassavetes. But all of these positives are so often overlooked, which, I believe, is down to the film’s main audience being women and girls.
It’s so difficult for the world to take romances and chick flicks seriously, no matter how big a fan base they have, but at least there are actors out there like Turner who can appreciate them.
