Often when you go see a film that has been based on a book, you notice many irregularities and the plot is changed in places it shouldn’t be. Even though that happened in places, Nicholas Sparks’ “The Lucky One” is still worth seeing.
Zac Efron stars as Logan, an ex marine who travels, or more accurately walks, across America in order to find Beth (Taylor Schilling) whose picture he believes saved his life numerous times during his time in Afghanistan.
Only wanting to say thank you for saving his life, he can’t quite manage to find the words and instead takes a job working in the kennels that her grandmother, Ellie, (Blythe Danner) owns before falling in love with her.
As with any romantic film their love has its complications with Beth’s ex husband Keith (Jay R. Ferguson) and Logan’s inability to tell her the real reason he’s there being the main ones.
Efron has come a long way since his High School Musical days and portrays Logan accurately and it was like the part was made for him. Schilling provided a stunning performance as well, portraying how a single mum manages her life whilst her ex husband is still hanging around.
Danner added comic relief to the film, breaking up all serious scenes and showing exactly why Ellie is loved by so many people. Ferguson was your average bad guy and showed that you can’t always get what you want by splashing the cash and making threats.
Riley Thomas Stewart put on a great performance as Beth’s son Ben and his performance combined with that of Schilling’s, had many laughing and crying along to the life that you felt a part of by the time the final credits rolled.
All of the scenes that were included in the book were there in the film in some respect but minor details were changed for no apparent reason. One example is that in the book, Ben gets hit with a baseball in the eye whilst playing baseball with his father in the garden. The film shows Ben getting hit in the nose with a baseball at a charity baseball game. It didn’t add anything extra to the story and could have easily been kept the same.
Despite the slight changes, the film was acted beautifully by all involved and told a romantic story that you left wishing was your own.