Review of The Last Station (2009) by Jake . — 14 Jul 2010

Damn, I loved this movie. It's at once bubbly and intoxicating, but at the same time incredibly heartbreaking. It's not a real movie. at all. But, neither does it try to be. The characters and situations are all the more beloved because we cannot totally believe them, totally relate to or understand the circumstance.

The characters are drawn in absolutes, but never really feel flat. They are all fasinating, most are even easy enough to love, but they are not complex in a human sense. They all at once completely focused, but at the same time they have the complexity needed to be confincing and understood.

The acting is obviously great. Everyone has already mentioned that fact, but really. Everyone is fantastic. I've always liked James McAvoy, but this is the first time his acting itself has really stood out as being incredible.

The Last Station is a relentlessly optimistic film, and the characters are as well. Which one obvious exception, these are all "nicer" people than the average person. It is even varied types of selflessness that pit them against one other.

Everyone feels they know what it best for everyone else, essentially causing all the strife in the film. Love can take many forms, but who is to say which is the best? We see family love, romantic love, pacifism, etc, each takes a different flavor, but each is based on one thing: Love.

And what is the antidote to this tragedy? Rules, boundaries, legalism. As Mash says to Valentin "You forgot the rules and remembered love." It is true sincerity that matters, the actions are irrelevant.

Love might cause one to give everything to better society or it might cause one to gather up a great inheritance. Neither action is better or worse than the other on it's own. We do not cherish and love people because of what they did FOR us, but because of what drove them to those actions.