IN A SUMMER packed with CG spectacles and smart-talkin' superheroes, The Notebook has little competition for this season's three-hanky crown. If the phrase "adapted from the Nicholas Sparks novel" sends you fleeing for the nearest exit (reference points: Message in a Bottle, A Walk to Remember), this probably isn't your kind of flick. But anyone looking for a sweet romance that mostly resists overdosing on sap (until the supersoggy last reel, when all bets are off) will easily be suckered in. Nick Cassavetes (John Q) directs his mom, Gena Rowlands, as an Alzheimer's patient kept company by a man (James Garner) who reads a handwritten tale of love lost and found again from the titular volume. The more interesting parts of The Notebook take place in flashback, as the couple – rich, spirited Allie (Rachel McAdams) and poor, soulful Noah (Ryan Gosling) – meet as teens in pre-World War II South Carolina. An intense relationship is forcibly ended by her parents; years later, when she's about to marry a bland Southern gentleman (James Marsden), Allie and Noah are fortuitously reunited. Sound familiar? The ghosts of thousands of star-crossed love stories haunt the plot, but enjoyable performances make The Notebook more memorable than such yarns. Though the younger actors are cast against type – McAdams was last seen catfighting with Lindsay Lohan in Mean Girls; Murder by Numbers' Gosling usually plays junior-psycho roles – they're both surprisingly effective here as googly-eyed lovers. (Cheryl Eddy)