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The Last Castle (2001)
Rate:
2
Viewed:
8/25
8/25:
For a very long time, I thought Havana was the most infamous film Robert
Redford ever did, and now, it's been replaced by The Last Castle.
The first half went well, putting me in a "let's see" mode, thanks to the high quality of the material despite
the several reminders of The Shawshank Redemption.
By the time the prison riot broke out, I was like, "Dude, you just lost me." The movie kept getting worse to
the end with no recovery whatsoever.
I have to say this: Colonel Ed Winter (James Gandolfini) was never in the wrong for one second. If the
military approves of what he's doing, then so be it. He's the warden, for goodness sake. If not, it can review
procedures and make adjustments in whatever, and Winter will just follow along. By the way, how did his
men not see the trebuchet being built in the yard as well as other weapons? If I were them, I would get rid of
all the rocks; they serve no purpose.
That means Eugene Irwin is the bad guy but gets away with it only because he's Robert Redford. I was never on
his side. In fact, I didn't know what the hell he was doing or what point he wanted to make. If there are
problems, he can always file a formal complaint. Given his former rank (a three-star general), he
has plenty of clout to make things happen, but I don't buy for a second somebody like him would be put in prison
like this. In any case, Winter should've isolated Irwin from the rest of the population, so his influence would
be virtually cut off.
As for the prisoners, why should I support them? What are they originally in for? I'm sure many are rapists,
murderers, and pedophiles. Didn't Irwin stop and think about that for a minute? For the less serious crimes, why
would some of the prisoners be okay in going along with the plan if they had no more than a few years remaining
in their sentences? Why would they follow Irwin if he previously had 18 men killed? Now, after the prison riot,
everybody can expect to receive an additional sentence of ten plus years. Death penalty won't be off the table
for some including Sam Yates who should've died in that spectacular helicopter crash.
Back in the 70's, Robert Redford did an extremely bad movie called
Little Fauss and Big Halsy, and he was constantly shirtless. I
thought it would be the last time he would do something foolish like that. When he took off his shirt after
moving back and forth to carry the rocks, it became the most cringeworthy movie moment of his entire career,
and he was 65 years old.
All in all, Brubaker works while The Last Castle is "what was
everybody thinking?"