Review of The Last Supper (1995) by Martin D — 04 Sep 2010

If you met Adolph Hitler when he was just a struggling cartoonist, wouldn't you have done the world a big favor by murdering him? That philosophical question provides the linchpin of this black comedy.

Jude (Cameron Diaz), Pete (Ron Eldard), Paulie (Annabeth Gish), Marc (Jonathan Penner), and Luke (Courtney B. Vance) are five graduate students who are confirmed members of the political left, participate in small-scale activism, and share a house together.

One night, Pete is stuck in the middle of nowhere, and Zack (Bill Paxton), a truck driver, gives him a lift home. The housemates are just about to sit down to dinner, so to show his gratitude, Pete asks Zack to join them.

However, it soon becomes obvious that Zack doesn't share the group's political views, and when he states that he thinks Hitler had the right idea, the argument turns into a fight, with Zack brandishing a knife.

The trucker is accidentally killed in the scuffle, and rather than report the death to the police, his body is buried in the backyard vegetable garden. However, the event prompts much discussion among the housemates -- if Zack was a hateful bigot, isn't the world better off without him? And wouldn't killing other ignorant hatemongers improve society all the more? Before long, the group is having a weekly dinner party in which they invite a special guest -- including an anti-environmental activist (Jason Alexander), a right-wing religious leader (Charles Durning), a sexist who doesn't believe there's such a thing as rape (Mark Harmon), and a teenager campaigning against sex education in schools (Erin Bryn) -- and serve them some wine, which happens to be laced with arsenic.

While the group's attempt at community improvement does wonders for their tomato plants, the recent disappearances eventually attract the attention of the local sheriff (Nora Dunn). The Last Supper was the first feature for director Stacy Title, who won an Academy Award for her short subject Down on the Waterfront; screenwriter Dan Rosen appears in a supporting role as a police deputy.