LAST MAN STANDING
A film review by James Berardinelli
Copyright 1996 James Berardinelli
RATING (0 TO 10): 6.0 Alternative Scale: **1/2 out of ****
United States, 1996 U.S. Release Date: 9/20/96 (wide) Running Length: 1:41 MPAA Classification: R (Violence, violence, and more violence) Theatrical Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
Cast: Bruce Willis, Christopher Walken, Bruce Dern, William Sanderson, David Patrick Kelly, Ned Eisenberg, Alexandra Powers, Karina Lombard, Michael Imperioli Director: Walter Hill Producers: Arthur Sarkissian and Walter Hill Screenplay: Walter Hill based on the story by Ryuzo Kikushima and Akira Kurosawa Cinematography: Lloyd Ahern Music: Ry Cooder U.S. Distributor: New Line Cinema
A number of words come to mind when considering Walter Hill's latest directorial effort, LAST MAN STANDING. One is violent. Another is excessive. A third is unnecessary. This exceptionally bloody film probably features more gunshots than all of Bruce Willis' DIE HARD movies put together. The atmosphere is so thick and pointlessly "artsy" that it threatens to choke the viewer. And, since this story has already been filmed twice before, in much better versions (Akira Kurosawa's 1961 YOJIMBO and Sergio Leone's 1964 A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS), the audience is left wondering why Hollywood felt the need to do it again.
The basic idea of LAST MAN STANDING is to transfer the samurai sword epic YOJIMBO from Japan in the 1860s to a small United States town in the Old West. However, since that's exactly what A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS did, the film makers felt compelled to add a prohibition-era flavor to the mix. The result is a bizarre mixture of western and gangster genres that doesn't really work. Tommy guns and tumbleweeds don't make for a perfect marriage, and the site of Bruce Willis, dressed in a crisp suit and fedora, striding through a dust storm towards the local saloon causes us to wonder if the costume and set designers didn't get their wires crossed.
Willis is "John Smith", The Man With No Name who has previously been essayed by Toshiro Mifune and Clint Eastwood. And, whatever other problems LAST MAN STANDING may exhibit, the lead actor's performance isn't among them. Laconic, tight-lipped (except during an irritatingly unnecessary dime-store novel voiceover), and grim-faced, Willis is right for the part. Smith is a mercenary and a mystery, and Willis keeps us curious about his history and what he plans to do next.
Smith arrives in Jericho, Texas (population: 57) on a hot, windy afternoon at the height of the prohibition era. The town is controlled by two gangs with their roots in Chicago (the question of why Chicago gangs would war over run-down Jericho is never satisfactorily explained): the Irish, led by Doyle (David Patrick Kelly), and the Italians, run by Strozzi (Ned Eisenberg). Smith's car undergoes some heavy damage when he is caught looking the wrong way at Doyle's girl, Felina (Karina Lombard). This pulls Smith into Jericho's unstable political situation. He learns that the sheriff, Ed Galt (Bruce Dern), is a crook, and there's not much difference between Doyle and Strozzi, except that Doyle has a sadistic henchman named Hickey (Christopher Walken) who kills for the sheer joy of it. Soon Smith, looking to make as much money as he can, is playing both ends against the middle, and is always one step away ahead of death.
Hill goes way overboard with atmosphere, incorporating elements of everything from traditional western and gangster motifs to film noir cliches. Almost every outdoor scene features a dust storm and every indoor sequence is heavily shadowed. At times, the blowing dust bleeds out color, leaving us with shots that appear to be almost black-and- white. It's a clever conceit, but totally superfluous. Atmosphere is supposed to be a background element, but Hill forces it into the foreground, as if attempting to overcompensate for structural and plausibility problems in his script. Then there's Ry Cooder's hard rock score, which seems vastly out of place for this sort of period piece.
Over-the-top, cartoonish violence is a big part of LAST MAN STANDING. The body count is way up there, and there's one instance when it takes approximately forty bullets to kill one man. Hill is not Sam Peckinpah, however, and, as a result, much of the bloodshed comes across as gratuitous rather than stylized. Sure, there are a lot of people we want to see killed, but this sort of wholesale carnage is more repetitious than satisfying.
Aside from Willis, the best acting job is turned in by Bruce Dern as the pragmatic, crooked sheriff of Jericho. Christopher Walken is at his maniacal best as Hickey, although, at this point in his career, I'm beginning to wonder if he can play anything other than a psycho. Most of the rest of the cast, including Karina Lombard (WIDE SARGASSO SEA), is unimpressive at best. Worse, the secondary characters are a poorly- developed lot, with motives that vary from incomprehensible to merely unexplained.
As a shallow tale of conscienceless bloodshed and revenge, LAST MAN STANDING is reasonably effective. But as an updated version of the far better-realized YOJIMBO, it's an unqualified failure. LAST MAN STANDING is a surface picture -- it looks good, sounds good, and moves quickly -- but there's no depth whatsoever. In the past, Walter Hill has done some great work (SOUTHERN COMFORT, 48 HOURS) and some less-than-great work (GERONIMO). LAST MAN STANDING falls closer to the latter category than the former.
- James Berardinelli e-mail: berardin@bc.cybernex.net ReelViews web site: http://www.cybernex.net/~berardin
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