Review of Last Action Hero (1993) by Scott W — 16 Jul 2013

I never saw this as a child, but watching it now for the first time, as an adult in the 21st century, I think its safe to say that while this film was self-aware, Hollywood and most of the world, were not. They were still stuck in that bubble that grew in the 80s and expanded well beyond the 90s until it finally started to thin out by the late 90s/early '00s. The movie within "Last Action Hero", which I believe is "Jack Slater III", is badly written, wacky and completely illogical. A young boy, Danny, is given a magic ticket by this old timer who runs the projection room in an old cinema. He gives him a magic ticket which allows Danny to go into the dimension of the movies. In this case, he somehow gets transported into "Jack Slater III", where the lead character, played by Arnold Schwarzenegger, doesn't know he is a character.

This film is a wonderful fantasy with some beautiful satire, manic action, colourful characters and an absurd sense of humour. It also has plenty of heart. While I do not think this film lives up to its full potential, it does enough to the point where I was entertained and left me with ideas. Arnold is quite bad and over the top in his performance, but like "Total Recall" (1990), his work services the story in a very interesting way, because of the displacement and unbelievable truths his character experiences. Charles Dance is perfect and brings his character a richness and class that you don't normally see in many "Arnie" films. The script is ambitious and I do not see the hate with this film. I'm pretty sure that if this was re-released worldwide, it would be welcomed more in this post- post-modern world. I do not consider myself an idiot, and while this film is wacky, I do not think it is bad at all, and is severely underrated. Arnie has only made a few great films (and I don't see him making any more0, and I would include this on the list. This movie did pose an important question to me: What kind of a world would we live in, if Arnold Schwarzenegger did Shakespeare? Think about it...