THE LAST ACTION HERO
A film review by Anna G. McDougald
Copyright 1995 Anna G. McDougald
When a theatre owner assures a film fan that there are far worse things than movies in this world, and that "Politicians are twice as bad as any of the rest"--you wonder just who he is really speaking for.
John McTiernan's LAST ACTION HERO seems, at times, a furious manifesto crafted specifically to answer official posturings on "movie violence." The roster of stars McTiernan has recruited for cameo appearances in this film would suggest his concerns are fairly widespread.
Unfortunately, it debuted at a time when the words ACTION and HERO, together, were as fondly received as a leper's warning-bell. (Just how the Tutsis, Yugoslavs and Khmer Rouge learned to commit the most awful outrages without help from Steven Segal remains a mystery!)
Danny Madigan (Austin O'Brien) is a young man any parent would happily claim. Neat, attentive, and properly respectful toward policemen and old folks, he finds cheerful solace in the campy "Jack Slater" movies, one of which his friend Nick (Robert Prosky) graciously premieres after presenting Danny him with a "magic ticket."
Danny is a Director's dream as well; corny dialogue and hokey effects don't bother him at all, if they're carried off with wit and style. As the the on-screen action starts to heats up, the ticket "activates" itself--and Danny is catapulted directly to his hero's side.
Unmoved by steadily escalating explosions, artillery barrages, and music blasts, Danny desperately tries to convince Jack Slater (Arnold Schwarzenegger, in a lovely bit of self-mockery) that this *is* after all, "just a movie." (It's amusing to note just who shows "real" intelligence here, and who has trouble with the concept!)
Before Danny can succeed in making Jack aware of the facts, the ticket activates itself again, this time in reverse, and expels the two into the "real" world as it falls into the hands of master-criminal Benedict (Charles Dance).
We are battered by what approaches cinematic overkill as Jack finds himself facing his old Nemesis (made corporeal as well with Benedict's help), and Danny frantically searches Nick's theatre for the other half of the ticket. Only by reclaiming it can Danny prevent the unleashing of even nastier monsters and assure Jack passage back to a world where the worst of wound is simply an inconvenience.
Was there a conspiracy in place to discredit this film, and its Director, from the very start? Granted, LAST ACTION HERO has plenty of flaws--length, and excessive self-reference being merely two. But what it says about movies of this genre must strike certain people as being totally unacceptable.
The notion that children can be quite capable of sorting fact from fantasy, that our fictional heros may be the only ones who never let us down, and that every movie ticket is "magic" in that it grants us access to worlds we could never otherwise visit, where we may view Evil in any number of guises while retaining the power to leave it exactly where it is--these, to some, are truly "dangerous" ideas.
Perhaps McTiernan tried a little too hard to make his point. Perhaps he let his penchant for irony at times get the upper hand. But if this is failure, it counts as a noble one. For, how else can you even begin to argue with people who won't believe it's "just a movie"?
-- Anna G. McDougald
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