DVD Review: The Last Boy Scout: Benjamin Agee, Denise Ames, Bob Apisa, Billy Bastiani, Ed Beheler, Halle Berry, Billy Blanks, Gene Borkan, Kevin Bourland, Sara Suzanne Brown, Dick Butkus, John Cenatiempo, Morris Chestnut, Kim Coates, Frank Collison, Ryan Cutrona, E. Brian Dean, Badja Djola, Rick Ducommun, Clarence Felder, Ward Russell, Michael Kamen: Movies & TV
DVD Review: The Last Boy Scout: Benjamin Agee, Denise Ames, Bob Apisa, Billy Bastiani, Ed Beheler, Halle Berry, Billy Blanks, Gene Borkan, Kevin Bourland, Sara Suzanne Brown, Dick Butkus, John Cenatiempo, Morris Chestnut, Kim Coates, Frank Collison, Ryan Cutrona, E. Brian Dean, Badja Djola, Rick Ducommun, Clarence Felder, Ward Russell, Michael Kamen: Movies & TV
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Bruce Willis and Damon Wayans star as yet another pair of mismatched detective buddies in this violent, cynical action movie about a discredited Secret Service agent turned gumshoe (Willis) who teams with a former pro-football quarterback (Wayans) to investigate sports corruption. The script by Shane Black moves and feels exactly like his script for Lethal Weapon, with the same wisecracks, putdowns, fights, scenes of torture, and over-the-top climax. Willis is on autopilot, and Wayans is all right but far from charismatic. Some of the supporting cast make a bigger impression, including Halle Berry and stand-up comic Taylor Negron, who plays a very mean accomplice of the film’s chief villain. The DVD release has remastered sound, optional full-screen and widescreen presentations, optional French soundtrack, and optional French, English, or Spanish subtitles. –Tom Keogh
the action film is carried to surreal extremes,
By ”birdstuff” (Canada) -
This review is from: Last Boy Scout [VHS] (VHS Tape)
the action film is carried to a rather intriguing extreme with THE LAST BOY SCOUT, a movie that pushes the world-weary detective stereotype to new, surreal levels. Joe Hallenbeck (Bruce Willis), is a shamus hired by his best friend to protect a stripper who is subsequently killed. her washed-up football playing boyfriend (Damon Wayans) hooks up with Joe to find out whodunit and why. Willis’ performance and Black’s screenplay combine to produce a portrait of a guy who is so down and out that our first glimpse of him is a shot of him passed out in his own car while being harassed by snotty neighbourhood kids. throughout the whole film, Willis delivers deadpanned one-liners while constantly getting the crap kicked out him. BOY SCOUT is a guilty pleasure. it is mindless, formulaic, and particularly hateful towards women (and men as well) in spots with an uncompromisingly un-PC attitude that is very unusual in this day and age… and very funny. action films don’t get any nastier than this one.
Very trashy but still entertaining action flick,
By Kenji Fujishima (East Brunswick, NJ USA) -
This review is from: The Last Boy Scout (DVD)
Tony Scott’s THE LAST BOY SCOUT may be trash, but for an action flick it is very well-made, highly entertaining trash.
Of course, you could make a very good case against this film. Though I did not find it quite as woman-hating as some of the critics said it was upon the film’s release, I would recognize that there is a subtle layer of misogyny throughout the movie—particularly with the two women characters in Joe Hallenbeck’s life, his uncaring, cheating wife and his bratty, verbally abusive daughter—that might make some viewers more queasy than I was. And, objectively speaking, THE LAST BOY SCOUT is basically a retread of writer Shane Black’s superior LETHAL WEAPON—a more foul-mouthed, ultra-violent retread with a lot of corny humor. This is an all-out testosterone-fest if I’ve ever seen one. If you’ve got a problem with people, just punch ‘em in the "head or gut"—if anything else, that’s the message of this movie. Really, Shane Black, where did your taste go since LETHAL WEAPON and LETHAL WEAPON 2?
Despite all that, though, this movie still delivers what matters most in this genre: thrills and exciting action scenes. Having seen this movie only recently, I must say that it is probably one of the most exciting action pictures I’ve seen in a long while, perhaps enjoyable because of its excesses. Tony Scott definitely knows how to film action scenes well (the climactic action scenes in the football stadium is a good example of his skill here), and of course he brings his customary slick style to the material. And its plot, involving a ruthless attempt to legalize gambling in pro football, takes some kinda intriguing twists and turns along the way. (It’s like a hardcore action-film version of one of those hardboiled detective films of the ’40s.)
In short, THE LAST BOY SCOUT is very trashy but still entertaining action movie that can be quite fun to watch, depending on whether you can overlook lapses of character logic (why on Earth is Shelly Marcone giving away his plan of framing Hallenbeck for Senator Baynad’s murder just so Hallenbeck can outsmart ‘em all?) as well as the more objectionable misogynistic aspects of the film. Personally, I felt a little guilty about enjoying it so much…but not guilty enough not to admit it. Marginally recommended.
The Last Boy scout says it best.,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Last Boy Scout (DVD)
The best action movie of the 90’s hands down! All this crap about the film being misogynistic is ridiculous. Willis’ character is a burned out, embittered, down and out, has-been PI and former secret service agent ("a long time ago he saved the president’s life" )who has seen too much and who has no faith left in anything. He is in a bad marriage, never home, drinks too much, a victim of marital infidelity. But he is still in love with his wife. ("I wish the sky wasn’t blue, I wish water wasn’t wet. I wish I didn’t still love my wife.") He is a man’s man of the old school; strong and ever silent with a black and white morality. He is loyal to a fault, taking on the case of the stripper and her boyfriend to avenge the car-bombing death of his best friend (who was sleeping with his wife.) His foul mouthed daughter is screaming for discipline which she finds (and drinks in ) at the end of the film. The one liners are great. The action scenes are awesome. The justice meted out in the end is fitting.
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