La última fortaleza

Redford's ability to fade into a character is profound. Sometimes an actor who has been in the business a very long time will become larger than any role he plays... John Wayne for example (with a couple of exceptions). He becomes Eugene Irwin in this movie. This movie isn't about Redford's character, just like "The Legend of Bagger Vance" isn't really about Bagger Vance. The Last Castle is about honor to one's self and honor among soldiers, even if they are prisoners. James Gandolfini's portrayal of a colonel who knows nothing of this honor or brotherhood is excellent. He makes you despise his character. Colonel Winters is a deeply disturbing study of corrupt power and jealousy of others' glory. A fine ensemble cast of characters make this movie well worth watching.

The last castle is unbelievably entertaining.

That may sound like high praise but when I say unbelievably , I mean I didn't believe a thing that I was seeing but it was definitely entertaining.

Robert Redford plays a court-martialed General who rallies together twelve hundred inmates to rise against a corrupt and sadistic warden played by James Gandolfini.

Robert Redford is a true movie superstar and he's pretty good in this considering his age but the star of this show is the brilliant James Gandolfini. His acting is subtle yet his every sound and facial movements say so much .

The story is ridiculous. Extremely ridiculous.

You could put this in the same bracket as Con Air , Face/Off and The Rock .

Extremely Entertaining but when you try to delve into the plot it makes you laugh .

The whole scene when the prisoners rise up and roll out a sling shot , hook a helicopter with a rope and have hand held catapults made me laugh out loud .

The prisoners were not believable either .

I know they were all military inmates but how they went from thugs to disciplined men was just silly .

Having said all I have I really enjoyed it . The time flew by and I was never bored and it's probably the last action film Robert Redford made and for 65 year old as the time he looked really good .

Such terrific entertainment. It's just a shame that it at the same time is such a bad film. Borrowing from numerous films like Shawshank Redemption, Murder in the First and The Great Escape to name a few, it is still somewhat different from what you expect.

The acting is eminent. Robert Redford does a fine performance as the reluctant hero, but two other actors are stealing the scenes even more so. The first is of course the fabulous James Gandolfini in a very different role than what we are used to from The Sopranos. I am a big fan of the TV series and I would never have thought that he would be able to play such a prick that I would actually hate him. The second actor worth extra praise is the new talent Mark Ruffalo who played so heartbreakingly well in the amazing You Can Count On Me from last year. He portrays an ordinary character with such heart and genuineness that the character becomes so much more interesting than it would with most actors.

The film is saved by its actors and its entertainment value. What pulls it down is all the logical errors and holes in the script. And I am sure many Americans will appreciate the excessive patriotism shown in the film, but it really gets too much.

Absolutely worth watching, but I have a feeling that this could have been so much more.

Rating: 7/10

If I think of Robert Redford, I think of actors like Barbra Streisand, Jane Fonda, Marlon Brando or Paul Newman. I think of 1960's and -70's blockbuster movies like "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" or "All the President's Men". And not to forget the "Sundance Film Festival" that Redford created with a name that he took from the former mentioned movie.

If I think of Robert Redford, I also think of the more than excellent movie "Brubaker". A movie in which he becomes warden of a prison that was a haven of corruption and abuse of the inmates.

In the movie "The Last Castle", we see Redford again feature in a prison movie. And this time it is not a '60's or '70's movie, but one from the early 21st century. And Redford's acting is still as great as ever!

The storyline behind the movie is unfortunately a bit too "standard". It doesn't tell a true story and neither does it put you on the edge of your seat. It is pretty predictable actually. I think the storyline was not really worthy of an actor as Redford.

But I have to admit that the movie is entertaining. This to the level that I give it 7.3 stars (rounded down to 7). It is the interaction between the two lead actors, Redford and James Gandolfini - the latter is very known for his role in Sopranos - that makes this movie an interesting one to watch.

Most of the raves and pans you will read of this movie are equally true in their own respects. For my money, the film's weaknesses slightly outweigh its strengths but I can easily see someone else's scales tipping the other way.

The performances are splendid all around. Most especially, James Gandolfini (who had the inside track with the most richly drawn character) excels as the ambiguous villain who is actually right more than half the time.

The message which deals with the value of pride and the importance of identity and self-worth is certainly admirable. The fact that this occurs among men who have marred their own self-worth through violent crime makes the concept that much more interesting. It almost (but never quite) raises the idea of reclaiming integrity, once lost. If it had gone this extra mile, it may well have been a better film.

The weaknesses lie in the hundreds of stupid little inaccuracies which culminate into one stupid BIG inaccuracy: This place doesn't feel like a prison!

It is difficult to make a prison movie within ten years of 1994 without inviting comparisons to "The Shawshank Redemption." Rather than belaboring the obvious, I want to note one detail that is exemplary of the earlier film's superiority. Even the jolliest, funniest, most easy going prisoners in Shawshank had an underlying sense of danger about them. You didn't want to get on their bad side. You never doubt that they belong in prison (except, of course, for Andy Dufresne). But this is not so in "The Last Castle." No matter how often someone reads from a prisoner's file and discusses the horrible things he has done, none of the words, actions, or other moods conveyed by the men in this film make them seem in any way dangerous. Maybe it's a case of mass miscasting but I doubt it.

Compounding this problem is the lack of scholarship to be found in the little details. Robert Redford shaves with a safety razor in spite of the fact that no prisoner would be allowed such a tool. Razor blades, like belts and shoelaces, are potential suicide tools and, thus, prohibited in prisons. Also, people keep referring to an officer's side arm as his "gun" instead of his "weapon." These mistakes were easy to avoid and yet they remained in the film.

All of this makes a potentially fascinating film, filled with talent, seem a touch removed from reality. Like in "The Contender," director Rod Lurie has shown that his view of reality is based on his opinions rather than the other way around.

With all it had going for it, it's a shame really.