072 - The Last Movie

Synopsis: The blurred edges between reality and movies

Director: Dennis Hopper

Actors: Dennis Hopper, Kris Kirstofferson, Don Gordon, Stella Garcia, Peter Fonda, Henry Fonda, Sylvia Miles, Sam Fuller, Dean Stockwell, Michelle Phillips, Julia Adams

Date: 1971

How viewed: Bought DVD from J4HI.com

Rating: 4/5

David Meyer says:

It's clear that Hopper was on the track of something miraculous, but for whatever reasons lacked the courage of his convictions while editing the final third of the film. Or that as a (totally self-destructive) director, preferred anarchy to a more conventionally satisfying conclusion.  

I say: 

On first viewing I found it very difficult to decide whether this film is an indulgent  mess or a masterpiece - and had to watch it again to try and see which side of the fence I came down on. I certainly liked it a lot more the second time - though a lot of it still didn't make sense! Dennis Hopper plays a wrangler with a film crew making a western in Peru - but after a stunt man accidentally dies on set (I admit I still didn't spot that!), he stays on in Peru with a local woman, but then finds out that the locals are making their own 'film', but are shooting each other for real. However, the film itself blurs the edges of what's real and what's imaginary, and is difficult to follow, due to the confusing timeline, the many jump cuts, various side plots (e.g. searching for a gold mine), and other unconventional devices (like the title not coming up until about 30 minutes into the film). The film does not seem to officially be on DVD, but I picked up a copy from J4HI ('Rare, Out of Print, and Lost Cult Film' - http://www.j4hi.com/index.html - well worth a browse!) and I've just realised that someone has posted it on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxNyUCE6kPo. However, both options are somewhat blurred, the sound's not great, and there's no subtitles (I find I tend to turn on the subtitles for everything these days - not just because my hearing may be going, but because the trend for mumbling means you can miss important details!). I also notice that there's also 'an extremely rare' documentary of Hopper editing the film, on youtube called 'The American Dreamer' (Hopper spent years editing the film in an 'unconventionally way in an attempt to break new cinematic ground'). The tagline for The Last Movie says 'Compared to this, every movie you've ever seen is just a film. This is cinema' - and whilst today its disjointed confusing feel would probably not feel out of place, 40 years ago it undoubtedly would have been considered revolutionary. See it at least twice, I think you might start to like it!