Review of The Last Detail (1973) by Jacek S — 02 Dec 2008

Since I don't share the admiration with the rest of the world for "Harold and Maude", finding it as a nice picture with flawed ending, and on the other hand admiring "Being There", it is "The Last Detail" that I come back to in Hal Ashby's catalogue, seeing it as his finest film. A classic, really. I mean, there are only a few pictures that have as fantastic opening scene as "The Last Detail" has. Won't you agree? Each time I hear first lines from Jack Nicholson's Billy "Bad Ass" Buddusky: "Go tell that MAA to fuck himself...", I'm almost falling off the sofa with a massive attack of laughter. I can't help it, it is so delicious.

No point talking about the plot since it's the language that plays a key role here, and this one is as strong as in "Pulp Fiction", or "Bugsy", or few other masterpieces of dialogue. Just as with "Who's Afriad of Virginia Woolf?" I can sit back, close my eyes and just listen to the dialogue as if it was Beethoven's 7th, some Mozart's Adagio or Nine Inch Nails' "Warm Place". It is real, true and hilariously funny at the same time and everything that's simply human is a gold these days.