Opening in theaters on Thursday, February 14th is the new romantic thriller from Academy Award-nominated director Lasse Hallstrom (The Cider House Rules, Dear John) entitled Safe Haven, which is based on the novel of the same name by extremely popular author Nicholas Sparks (The Notebook, Dear John). The film features an excellent cast that includes Josh Duhamel (Transformers: Dark of the Moon), Julianne Hough (Rock of Ages), Cobie Smulders (The Avengers), and David Lyons (TV's Revolution), as well as young actors Noah Lomax (Playing for Keeps), and Mimi Kirkland. 

IAR's Managing Editor Jami Philbrick recently had an opportunity to sit down with Nicholas Sparks to talk about his work on Safe Haven. The popular author discussed the new film, adding different themes to this romantic story, why North Carolina is almost its own character in all his movies, reuniting with the Oscar-nominated Lasse Hallstrom, if he minds when the director improvises on set, and if he thinks this film will do for Josh Duhamel and Julianne Hough what The Notebook did for Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams.