Deprecated: mb_convert_encoding(): Handling HTML entities via mbstring is deprecated; use htmlspecialchars, htmlentities, or mb_encode_numericentity/mb_decode_numericentity instead in /var/www/html/wp-content/plugins/super-cool-ad-inserter/inc/scaip-shortcode-inserter.php on line 37
Today: Can a sweet sorority girl (Britt Robertson) find true love with a bull-rider (Scott Eastwood) fighting back from a head injury? Or what about the 1940s, where there’s an Austrian Jewish refugee (Oona Chaplin) who wants lots of kids and a war hero (Jack Huston) with a … uh … significant injury? How could these two romances possibly intersect, and why must everything happen in North Carolina?
Welcome to this year’s Nicholas Sparks adaptation, where the magical glue is — surprise! — modern art. (No, really. Willem De Kooning is a very minor character.) George Tillman Jr.’s film is less baroque (read: soap-opera tragic) than some of the earlier Sparks films, though its low-key earnestness does make it fairly slow going. The decent actors help — Alan Alda is also on board — even if this fare is below them, and fans of Sparks’ water-based romancing won’t be disappointed. (There’s a pond and a walk-in shower in a very groovy barn loft.) As some other great writer said, “It is what is,” and you already know whether it’s for you.
This article appears in Apr 15-21, 2015.

