In this story of a young Iraqi war veteran who discovers a picture of a beautiful woman in the middle of a rubble pile that becomes his lucky charm, a young man sets off on a cross-country walk to find this mysterious woman and a whirlwind love affair ensues. With a screenplay adapted from a New York Times best-selling Nicholas Sparks book, and young hearthrob Zac Efron looking to break out of his stereotypically youthful roles, this movie has all the elements of a lucrative love story.

The plot centers around Logan, who is going through post-traumatic stress disorder and is searching for healing and a chance to make amends. In recent roundtable interviews promoting the film, Sparks explained, "The post war situation is different for everybody it's as different as the individuals. When they come back, they are different. The differences manifest themselves in a lot of ways. You have some people who commit suicide or they drink too much or they're unemployed. Logan is one of them. Here is a guy that says: I lost all my friends, this profoundly moves me. My solution is not to drink; it's to walk across the country."

His decision to let go and to move on is the driving force behind this story and gives it a unique vulnerability. But it also paints an interesting picture of the healing power of love as Sparks addresses: "These are people that come together and they heal and this is a real life journey and they heal through love which is, of course, God's primary message."

This film also touches on a subject that sets it apart from other love stories out there: the idea of luck and destiny. The world uses the terms fate and destiny to describe things that are out of our control or meant to be. Believers call it God's will for our lives. Which brings up an interesting question: "Can our destiny also be construed as God's will in our lives?" The two seem to be intertwined in the bible, most notably in Psalms 73:24 where it says, "You guide me with your counsel, leading me to a glorious destiny." It's about as complicated as that age-old theological debate of predestination versus freewill.

Taylor Schilling, who plays Beth, weighed in. "I definitely feel like there's a guiding force in my life on some level. I'm pretty clear on that. But I also feel that we're creating what's going on too, so maybe both." A theory shared by many believers, that we are both pre-ordained to walk the path we're on, yet we still have the choice to do so.

The movie's beginning scenes are of wartime soldiers clinging onto life and looking for any kind of hope to see them through. Logan finds it in a picture, as Zac Efron points out. "When that picture shined in his eyes it was an undeniable sign. I think there are some of those things you see and you suddenly realize you're ear-to-ear grinning and just as that happens it also saves his life; so how can you deny that's a sign?" These signs can also be construed as the Holy Spirit's leading in our lives. Believers use these signs, or leadings, to make difficult decisions or take paths which may have otherwise ignored. We see this in the main character as he uses this sign, this symbol of hope, to take a chance and take an alternative path. Though the terms can sometimes be interchangeable, it's easy to see that whether by chance, by destiny, or by design, the character's lives are unequivocally changed. And the movie is all the better for it.