Photo provided by Warner Bros entertainment.

Just think. You’re in the Marines, fighting for your life in a parched desert of Iraq. You have surprisingly made it out of your last raid, while the suffering man next to you dies in agony. The next morning, you spot a picture covered with all of the dry, parched dirt. You pick it up and it shows a woman, probably a loved one, reading: “Keep Safe.” You decide that you will find the woman in the photo, whatever it takes.

“The Lucky One” is  a love story written by Nicholas Sparks that was released in theaters on April 20, 2012. It puts love, tragedy and conflict all into one tear-jerking story.

It was a very beautiful movie (and I’m not just talking about Zac Efron, who plays the main character, Logan). I’m talking about the incredible scenery that is shown in every scene. It goes between beautiful sunsets and willow trees to a boat on the rippling shore of a lake.

In the story, Logan (Efron) goes to find this mystery woman Beth (Taylor Schilling), and ends up finding her in the small Louisiana countryside working and living in their family’s dog kennel business. He takes up a job there and soon becomes very attracted to her. She soon warms up to him and it winds up to be a perfect love story.

In every love story, there has to be a person in the way, someone who opposes the relationship of the lovebirds. In this movie, the antagonist is Beth’s ex-husband, who fights them the whole way. Beth’s ex, Keith (Jay Ferguson), is the man who fits this description. He turns the story into a tragedy and brings problems that everyone would have hoped to avoid. Keith is one of those men who is prone to fighting, and will pick a fight whenever he wants. He brings his belligerence to the relationship of Beth and Logan and resorts to using his and Beth’s son to make a fight this time.

All of the characters did a great job in this movie, and seemed to make the Nicholas Sparks’ novel come to life. They created imagery and scenes that would seem impossible when reading the book.

By ABI BROOKS