Last Days

Just watched this movie a couple of hours ago. To say I was disappointed would be an understatement. I'm a big fan of Gus Van Sant so I wasn't prepared for this pretentious little number!! It was long, long, long. I sat with the remote control in my hand wanting to press the FF button but out of respect for this great director I chose not too. I hoped something towards the end might enlighten........nope. The actors however did a good job with what they were given and I did like the boys from 'the church of the Latter day saints' scene. Was it supposed to be based on Kurt Cobains last days?? I honestly hope that the good man Kurt did not spend his last days in such a boring capacity. I was also a fan of grunge in the 90's, I hoped for more of a grungy feel to the movie and maybe some more music. It was too light on music, drug scene etc. If you're after an entertaining, music-filled homage to Kurt Cobain..this is not the movie for you. Too soft for me

Last days This is the final instalment of Gus van sant's trilogy of the disenfranchised and the alienated human condition. It began with 'Gerry' dealing with two guys trapped in a desert with no way of finding civilisation again and continued with 'elephant' dealing loosely with the columbine school killings. Last days is loosely based on the life of Kurt Cobain the late nirvana singer. Last days is really gelephant a mix of the first two films. Similar themes like repetition and the same story told from different characters perspectives are lifted straight out of elephant and the endless, hopeless tracking shots of despair are taken out of Gerry. Here the main character Blake is lost, unlike the two central characters in Gerry who are lost in the desert without hope, Blake is lost in his own head seemingly without hope. We meet Blake in the title of the film, his last days, being destroyed by drugs (although we never see him take anything harder than a cigarette) and emotional vampires who pretend to be his friends sucking the life out of him coupled with the pressure of fame and impending 86 date tours, Blake is quite simply falling apart. Here though it is a beautifully subtle take on madness, gone are the visions you see in films like 'Jacobs ladder' replaced with a clever underscore of sounds of doors opening and closing and mutterings and oddities. It's as if as you travel round with Blake you too can here the doors of insanity opening in his head, you too struggle to make out all the sounds. It's gently handled but eerily effective in linking you in with Blake's mindset. Elsewhere he stumbles and crawls round trying to function in the face of increasing paranoia and his drug addled inability to perform even the simplest of tasks. With record executives, band members, his manager and a private investigator all on his trail doing little for his state of mind Blake only seems comfortable when making music. This is also the only thing he can do with any sense of achievement, this could be down to the fact that it is second nature or the fact that he is a musical genius. The film also has an amazing sense of space, the landscapes around the mansion, the emptiness of its rooms and the vacuous nature of the hangers on to Blake's coat tails. With some amazing scenes, look out for the Venus in furs scene and the amazingly shot and framed acoustic song performed by Blake in the studio with probably one of the best little pieces of improvisation I've ever seen, this is a brilliant and touching portrayal of a great man left to fall to pieces by those who should have helped him stay together. Although different in its approach it deals with madness in a way not seen since Polanski's 'repulsion' and ultimately it is a film that stays with you long after the final chilling shot.

SPOILER WARNING....

Now i will be commenting on a few things in the film but whether or not they can be considered spoilers i will leave up to you, my own personal opinion is that a film must first have a plot before it can be spoiled in any way.

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Well i just finished watching this film 20 minutes ago so i'm writing this fairly fresh and still haven't completely formed an opinion of it, its probably best me writing these comments in this state of mind because most of you will probably be thinking the same thing.

I watched this film without reading any reviews seeing any ratings or hearing about it through word of mouth, after 2 minutes of seeing Micheal Pitt as "Blake" you will clearly see Kurt Cobain, 30 minutes later you will be slightly confused by just what the hell you are watching and for a time this movie will seem like a chore to watch and if i'm honest it just carry's on like that.

So why then did i give it 7 out of 10? Because roughly an hour into the film i was actually impressed by something, up until this point in the film all you see is a blonde skinny guy fumbling around looking like his half way to falling asleep or down a flight of stairs, this is pretty much what you have watched up to now. Then he starts playing guitar and singing, now i have been a Nirvana fan since i was 13 years old and that spans almost half my life time, this one scene reminded me why. Its a shame this is a movie site otherwise i could carry on with a review that could get me hired by rolling stone, but it isn't so i won't.

To sum up, if your looking for a source of entertainment please forgive me for the caps and DO NOT WATCH THIS. This is not a film you watch to be entertained in any form, if you watch this searching for something to give you a thrill or move you in anyway you will most likely be let down by it, an example of why this would be so? how about at one point in the film you are watching a TV showing a Boyz 2 Men video for the entire duration.

However, if you want to watch a film with some incredible acting, great direction and is a good deal different to anything else thats had a decent size release to it lately this might be for you.

It may also be worth it for Nirvana fans to check out. ;)

Gus Van Sant completes his trilogy of films revolving around the theme of death and friends (Gerry, Elephant, Last Days). However this is the weakest of the group as it, unfortunately, is tied to an event that is meaningful to many. As Lennon's death hit the generation of the 60's, Cobaine's death was a blow to those raised in the 80's and 90's. Many expect this film to be an interpretation of the last days of Kurt and the film is very loosely based on those facts. There is very little dialog as most of the film is music / sounds (sound design by Sonic Youth) and the film repeats events attempting to show the same moment from various viewpoints. Gus misses many opportunities and instead aims for an overall aesthetic (it was even shot in TV aspect ratio, 4:3, instead of film) rather than creating a typical storyline.

For Gus fans, the film is a welcome sight but for traditional movie goers, the talents of Michael Pitt and company are not challenged and the visual aesthetic disappoints an expectation of character development, storyline, and drama.

Gus Van Sant does a remarkable job with this film - "Last Days." Nothing much happens, there is not a lot of dialogue but what we see, experience, is the slow demise of an individual into oblivion. We are observers, albeit at a distance. The urge maybe there to intervene; deliberately evoked by the structure of Van Sant's film. We want to say: 'You do not have to go on like this. We can help.' The structure is like a memory recalled. We keep going over it, adding bits as we do to try to make more sense, but never arriving at a definitive version. We especially hope that when the advertising salesman calls to the house and Blake lets him in,that he will engage with the man and forget his morose preoccupations. But the gulf between the two is unbridgeable. The nadir of the film is when Blake, left alone by his friends in the rehearsal room, starts to play on his guitar. His voice echoes his inner anguish, rising from a low to a high and then back to a low. He even manages to break a string on the guitar, but dexterously pulls the string while continuing the song. How could such music come out of such gloom? This is the paradox of creativity -- of trying to give form to ideas, not yet realized. We wait in anticipation, incapable of giving directions. Blake is constantly trying to evade the intrusion of others but cannot transcend his own self, of being in the world. The final intrusion finds him not there; he is dead.