Nicholas Sparks is a brand name. He’s the author of mawkish, bestselling romantic novels that Hollywood keeps turning into even worse mawkish, romantic films, several of which have scored at the box office.

The list includes “The Notebook,” by far the best and most successful of the lot, as well as “Message in a Bottle,” “Nights at Rodanthe,” “A Walk to Remember,” “Dear John” and “The Last Song.”

The latest novel of his to arrive on the big screen is “The Lucky One.” A slack and predictable love story, which takes place mostly in rural Louisiana, it is the filmic equivalent of trudging through syrupy sorghum.

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Willem Dafoe, his gaunt, weathered face all sharply chiseled angles, determinedly hikes through dense foliage and across mountain meadows, setting and baiting traps.

He’s in the mountains of Tasmania, the Australian island state that’s 150 miles south of the mainland.

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An American mercenary, he’s trying to catch a Tasmanian tiger, a wolf-like marsupial believed to have been...

Life is teaching some lousy lessons to Cyril, an abandoned 11-year-old boy who can’t wrap his head around the fact that his single father has not only ditched him but, worse, sold his bicycle.

Cyril (Thomas Doret) is the pint-sized protagonist of “The Kid With a Bike,” an achingly heartfelt drama from directors-writers Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, the Belgian brothers with a string of impressive art house credits, including “La Promesse” and “L’Enfant.”

“Bike,” their latest -- like their other films,...

Anyone who has ever spent time in an old house knows that they creak. All sorts of things can, and do, go bump in the night.

Horror films like “Silent House” exploit the thin line -- at least for suggestible and susceptible viewers -- between creaky and creepy.

“Silent House,” which is based on “La Casa Muda,” a 2010 Uruguayan film, does creepy with artistic pretentions. Written by Laura Lau and directed by Lau and Chris Kentis (the married couple’s previous film was “Open Water”), this low-budget indie is filmed in a series of extended takes. Additionally, the camera work is...