Review of The Last Stand (2013) by Jesse O — 02 Nov 2013

Kim Jee-woon has directed one of my favorite Korean films of all time, The Good, The Bad, and The Weird. He also directed an incredible revenge thriller, I Saw The Devil. He also did one of the better ghost stories, until its ridiculous twist, in The Tale of Two Sisters.

So this guy is certainly very talented, so color me a little disappointed when I heard that his first American film would be an action movie starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. As much as Kim tries to say that he was attracted to the project because of the need to protect something, no matter how small, the fact of the matter is that this is a big, loud, dumb action movie that lacks a strong story.

But, at the same time, a movie being loud and dumb isn't necessarily a bad thing if you know what you're doing, and Kim certainly knows what he's doing. To the point where this movie is actually a perfectly solid, if particularly unimpressive, action movie with some western influences.

The movie, though, is really more a showcase for Schwarzenegger and not much else as the movie doesn't really do much that is inventive, it just focuses on a lot of shootouts and chase sequences. The shootouts are very well done because they're far more violent than your typical Hollywood action film.

This is because they use blood squibs for almost every shootout, except when they absolutely can't, so you really do get to see the impact the bullet makes, or would've made if this were real.

So that was definitely a highlight of the film, the shootouts really do have much more of an impact than your typical Hollywood movie, where they add in the blood effects in post. The story isn't really much to talk about.

It's your typical action movie story, nothing to write home about. I do think the movie could've used a little more comedic relief, but it's not like the movie takes itself too seriously. It knows that it is a big, dumb action movie.

The acting, per Schwarznegger standards, isn't bad but it's not like it's good either. The cast is certainly more than adequate, but the movie's not really about them. That's about it really, there really isn't that much to say about this movie that hasn't been said already.

It's fine escapist entertainment, it doesn't require a lot of brainpower to get through.