The Best of Me
Relativity Media | Release Date: October 17, 2014 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
29
METASCORE
Generally unfavorable reviews based on 26 Critic Reviews
Positive:
1
Mixed:
9
Negative:
16
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
63
Chicago Sun-TimesBill ZweckerOct 16, 2014
The Best of Me was a better film than I expected. Much of that is due to the performances delivered by Marsden, Monaghan, Liana Liberato and especially young Australian actor Luke Bracey as the younger version of Marsden’s character. Read full review
60
Time OutTom HuddlestonOct 21, 2014
Movies this silly, crass and manipulative really shouldn’t be allowed to exist in 2014. But we’re guiltily glad that they do. Read full review
50
RogerEbert.comSusan WloszczynaOct 17, 2014
As a moviegoer, however, you do have a choice. Either weep with them–or laugh at them. Or stay far, far away. Read full review
50
USA TodayClaudia PuigOct 16, 2014
What makes it slightly better than the others is an affable, low-key chemistry between James Marsden and Michelle Monaghan as star-crossed lovers. Read full review
50
New York PostSara StewartOct 16, 2014
Like the artificially sweetened junk food it is, this all goes down pretty easily. Read full review
42
The PlaylistKimber MyersOct 18, 2014
The Best of Me features actors who are playing well above their material, but Monaghan and Marsden aren’t enough to save this film. Read full review
42
The A.V. ClubIgnatiy VishnevetskyOct 16, 2014
The Best Of Me is neither the best Sparks adaptation, nor the worst; it’s merely the most recent. Read full review
40
New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike ScottOct 17, 2014
The Best of Me is full-on Nicholas Sparks, through and through, checking all the boxes in the by-now well-established formula. It's just not the best of Nicholas Sparks. Read full review
40
The DissolveScott TobiasOct 17, 2014
It’s a case study on how the quality of screen partners is only as good as the quality of the romantic obstacles separating them. Read full review
40
VarietyJustin ChangOct 16, 2014
This tale of two former lovers reuniting after a 21-year separation also functions as a study of two terrific actors struggling to overcome the relentless mediocrity of their material. Read full review
38
Philadelphia InquirerTirdad DerakhshaniOct 17, 2014
The Best of Me is neither worse than his other films nor particularly better. At 118 minutes, it is, however, one of the longest. Interminably long, dragging out its molasses heart through what seem like three different endings. Read full review
38
Boston GlobePeter KeoughOct 16, 2014
Isn’t fate a funny thing? Especially when Nicholas Sparks makes it up. Filmmakers love to adapt his stuff because he puts together narratives riddled with contrived coincidences and implausibilities meant to seem like the workings of providence when in fact they are the creations of a hackneyed mind. Read full review
38
McClatchy-Tribune News ServiceRoger MooreOct 16, 2014
The Best of Me plays like the worst of Nicholas Sparks. Read full review
37
Washington PostStephanie MerryOct 16, 2014
Even as characters are tweaked and actors bring a slightly different energy than his other movies, The Best of Me is still the same mushy Nicholas Sparks adaptation with drama so overwrought audience members can’t help but laugh — at least until they’re sniffling during the closing credits. Read full review
30
The Hollywood ReporterSheri LindenOct 16, 2014
Aaron Zigman’s score provides reassuring downhome uplift — perhaps a necessary element in a tale of impossible, perfect love, where everything happens for a reason and is as it should be, even when it’s terrible. Read full review
30
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzOct 16, 2014
You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll be swept away — about as much as you would be by artificial roses. Movies like this may look like the real thing, but they're not. Read full review
30
TheWrapJames RocchiOct 16, 2014
The bad news is that no matter how charming or fizzy the chemistry between the actors might be, they're still trapped in the dead, fake melodrama and brainless coincidences of a Nicholas Sparks story. Read full review
25
Entertainment WeeklyJason ClarkOct 17, 2014
Even with lowered expectations toward escapist fare taken into account, the film is a long slog, with Marsden and Bracey conveying little but Crest smiles and smolder, while Liberato and Monaghan are stuck doing endless cry-face. Read full review
25
Slant MagazineEric HendersonOct 17, 2014
Even permitting that the movie's setup counts almost by default as one of Nicholas Sparks's more complicated scenarios, that makes his failure to draw up compelling, flawed, human characters all the more conspicuous. Read full review
25
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Liam LaceyOct 16, 2014
Sparks’s preposterous approach has crystalized into cliché. Read full review
25
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe WilliamsOct 16, 2014
Sparks would be delighted if this movie were compared to his other story about reunited lovers, but compared to “The Notebook,” The Best of Me is the coffee-stained outline of a sales pitch for sleeping pills. Read full review
25
San Francisco ChronicleMichael OrdonaOct 16, 2014
The film is an improvement on previous Sparks moody-doomed-love opuses such as “The Last Song” and “Dear John.” If that is damning with faint praise, the cogs here are the same as in his previous love machines Read full review
20
New York Magazine (Vulture)Bilge EbiriOct 17, 2014
In The Best of Me, the melodrama feels so hurried and half-baked that the end result isn’t just disappointing. It’s borderline infuriating. Read full review
20
The New York TimesStephen HoldenOct 16, 2014
The screenplay is so haphazardly constructed that when the movie seems to be ending, it refuels with preposterous new developments. Read full review
20
New York Daily NewsElizabeth WeitzmanOct 16, 2014
There have been times when the right team has been able to transcend the gooey schmaltz of Sparks’ stories. This effort, however, sinks like a rock thrown into a sun-dappled lake shaded by magnolia trees sparkling under a sky of shooting stars. Read full review
11
Austin ChronicleKimberley JonesOct 15, 2014
Already hobbled by an overwrought story that turns positively Hallmark-Movie-preposterous in its third act, journeyman director Michael Hoffman (Soapdish, The Last Station) can’t conceive of a single memorable set-piece or rouse his actors into action. By the time Marsden’s character has very polite sex with the love of his life with his pants still on, I was done. Read full review
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