The Lucky One

So... In case you're wondering... I did watch this with my girlfriend. I didn't just sit down in front of the TV one night and say, let's watch a Nicholas Sparks movie... that's not how this night went... just so you know.

But I may have gone into this movie with an unfair bias. I mean its one thing that its a Nicholas Sparks movie, its another thing that its Zac Efron. As you can probably tell, this movie was not made for me.

The Lucky One follows the story of a Marine (played by Zac Efron) who one morning after a night raid in Iraq finds the picture of a woman in the sand. What follows is one or two situations where he should have been killed and he survives. He tries explaining that the reason he survived was because of this photograph, as if that woman was his guardian angel.

Now, before I move on, I must point out the elephant that's in the room.

I do not buy Zac Efron as a Marine. I've met Marines before. Nothing against the Marines, I have a deep respect for them, but they're fucking nuts. You have to be a special kind of crazy to be a Marine, and Zac Efron does not look or play a character that I would buy as a Marine. Maybe as someone in the Army, and that's not suppose to be a knock on the Army, but even then, its a stretch. Maybe, again, I'm coming from a bias that I can only see Zac Efron as the guy from High School Musical, I haven't seen him in enough stuff to differentiate him from that, and this movie doesn't do it for me.

Well Zac Efron returns home and goes to live with his sister. Now obviously, Zac is suffering from some major PTSD. Like he is kinda messed up. So there's a quick sequence at his sister's house, his nephews are assholes and he leaves. And the PTSD is never mentioned again.

Seriously, I had a couple moments where I thought the PTSD was going to kick in. He is asked to drive someone, I thought it was going to kick back his PTSD... it didn't. I thought the tractor he was fixing was going to backfire and kick in his PTSD... it backfired... and nothing happened. After the first sequence, his PTSD is never mentioned, ever again.

I don't think the movie is at all offensive to the military or people with PTSD, but it doesn't really do a great job portraying either.

But moving on, Zac goes out to Louisana to find the girl in the picture and he finds a woman by the name of Beth (played by Taylor Schilling) who owns a kennel at her house with her grandmother and her son. Zac tries to tell her why he came but ends up getting a job with her and not telling her that he kinda creepily stalked her... but I'll get to that.

Now I had better talk about the other elephant in the room with this movie. Taylor Schilling is a little bit older than Zac Efron. Now its not a huge age different, Efron is 26 and Schilling is 30. Its not that weird.

Well it kind of is. I don't mean to knock Schilling, she is a gorgeous woman and if I found her picture on a battlefield and it saved my life, I would want to come find her as well. And I don't think its because she looks old, I think its more that Zac Efron looks young and makes her look a lot older than he does. Again, Taylor Schilling is gorgeous, I just want that to be put on record. I had no problem watching her in this movie. She was very easy on the eyes.

It just kind of made the dynamic between the two a little strange when they actually look like there's a big age difference between the two.

I mean look at this picture.

Its not because she looks old but because Zac Efron looks so young that it looks like she's his mom. There's no mention of it in the film but there's kind of this weird cougar Oedipus complex between the two and its a little bit weird to watch them have sex.

Besides that, the chemistry between the two isn't phenomenal and that's kind of essential when it comes to a Nicholas Sparks movie.

But I digress.

Zac comes to work for her and her grandmother and learns that she has a son she would do anything for, and she had a brother who died in Iraq. She also has an ex-husband who is the Sheriff in the town. Basically, Zac comes to work for them, they fall in love, they have a misunderstanding facilitated by the evil ex-husband that eventually works out, the bad guy gets his kumuppins, and Zac and his girl get together. Its very, very predictable and cliche. If you've seen a Nicholas Sparks movie, you've probably seen this movie. Maybe not with the EXACT plot but you know what happens, how the relationship happens, how it gets thrown off and how in the last 5 minutes comes back together. Its not a spoiler, its a Nicholas Sparks movie. 

As far as individual performances go, I've already kind of talked about Zac Efron in this movie. 

He doesn't sell himself as a Marine, he doesn't sell himself as a 25 year old, he's just Zac Efron. The only reason he's in this film is because somebody (probably Sparks himself) said it would make a bunch of horny girls go nuts to see Zac Efron in a romantic Sparks movie and make the studio a lot of money. Again, I have not seen enough to convince me that Zac Efron is a good actor. I've heard he was good in That Awkward Moment and Neighbors and maybe is making a name for himself as an actor now. But what I'm saying is he's not doing it with this movie. All he does it stand around, looking awkward and piercing me with those steel blue eyes. 

I've already talked a little bit about Taylor Schilling. Her performance was a little bit better than most of the cast. I have seen her in Orange is the New Black and I think she is talented. Now I don't think this is the best movie for her and the chemistry between her and Efron is still off but there's a little bit of solace in the fact she wasn't the worst part of the movie. 

Then there's the kid, he's not great, he's not horrible, he's just a kid actor. He's only there to create another element to the plot. I'm not gonna say much more about him. 

The character I do want to talk about is the ex-husband. 

Oh man, talk about a running cliche. From the very beginning, the ex-husband (played by Jay R. Ferguson) comes in to the plot and might as well have said, Hello, I'm going to be the asshole in the movie. You're not going to like me for the entire movie. I'm really only here to create problems for the main characters. 

And the unfortunate part is that there really isn't any reason as to why this guy is an asshole, he's just a southern, asshole Sheriff. I think that they try and give him some reason near the end on how he's still in love with his ex-wife, but if that was the direction they were trying to go, they didn't do it that well. So this guy goes the entire movie just being an asshole for the sake of being an asshole. He's not a deep character, he's just the asshole who points a gun at the main character and his dog. 

And the worst part is that instead of being an actual bad guy or creating an actual problem for the main characters to overcome, he ends up just being an annoyance. Like I said before, the most extreme thing he does is point a gun at Zac Efron and his dog. If they wanted him to create some real drama, they would have had him kill Zac's dog or run away with his son. In the end, they didn't want to go too far with him because near the end they try and redeem him. With how weak of a character he is, when this guy bites it, instead of feeling bad like the movie wants us to, we just feel, well that annoying character is dead, now for the resolution. 

So in the end you kind of wonder, what was the barriers here? Was it his PTSD? No that goes away really quickly. Was it the ex-husband? Sorta? That kind of goes away half way through the movie when Taylor Schilling stands up for herself. So the real drama comes from the picture. 

Now unless you're stupid, you probably figured that a guy having a picture of a woman he doesn't know is going to create a problem. Even more when you realize that that picture belonged to her now dead brother. 

The movie actually walks a very careful line to make that action charming instead of creepy. Zac basically says that he feels as though he was suppose to die multiple times and if he was ever to find the woman in the picture, he would thank her. Well it could have been a lot worse and seem a little stalkery. The movie does an alright job at making it a little less creepy than it is when you think about it. 

In the end, is it a horrible movie? No. I'm not saying its good, but it does provide a romantic movie if that's what you need. Are you a guy looking for a romantic movie night? Its probably not the best choice but its cheesy, its romantic, and it'll appeal to most girls inner dream to be courted by Zac Efron. In short, its a good date movie. Not the best but not the worst. 

Expect some hokey acting, expect some really cliched story and if you're still interested you might as well pick it up and experience it for yourself. 

But those are my thoughts on The Lucky One. Have you seen it? What did you think? Am I crazy in thinking there's this weird cougar Oedipus complex going on between Zac Efron and Taylor Schilling? Comment and discuss below. 

I'll leave you with this. I think this is probably the only good thing that came out of the High School Musical movies and its The Sound of Music being dubbed over footage from High School Musical. Enjoy!