Last Orders

This is acting of the very highest order by a British dream cast. The pace is leisurely, the tone sad, the journey well worth taking. Why no Oscar nominations? This is so un-Hollywood, it's a balm for adults who want to appreciate the cream of British talent.

You know, when I saw this film, there were maybe seven people in the huge theatre at Loews Outer Circle DC. It was kind of disconcerting. I mean, who could blame people -- the film got no billboards or even advertisements, and I only heard about it through reviews in the paper. But this one's a keeper: last time you had Caine & Hoskins working like this was Neil Jordan's crime drama "Mona Lisa." It's great to see them reunite.

This is really an ensemble film, with great direction and great editing as well. The flashbacks are very well placed, so you don't get a sense of distraction as much as clarification as the filkm goes on. And the filmmakers wisely decide to use visual cues for the memories, instead of arbitrary looks back at the past.

I can say after seeing this film, I hope that I can end my life with the same kind of buddies as Jack Dodds (withou' o' co'se the necessi'y o' ge'in sloshed every nigh'.) The ensemble really works well off each other -- Ray Winstone, who was nearly incomprehensible in Sexy Beast, here shows a bit more substance as Jack's wayward but successful son. Helen Mirren pulls in a much more vulnerable performance than usual as Jack's wife (and the woman who played her as a young woman is stunning.) Tom Courtenay and David Hemmings provide a nice contrast as the proper undertaker Vic, and the drunken ex-boxer Lenny, yet you can see how they would both appeal to a guy like Jack, a lover of life.

Of course, for reasons I don't know if I'll ever get, Hoskins is the anchor. I've watched him for many years, playing brutes and sidekicks, mobsters, and fathers, at times playing the Irish, the Australian, the English, or the Italian-American. He has way of blending in and winning your attention. He can be brash, idiotic, cruel, or sweet, wise, and bold, but either way you kind of root for the guy. You can always seem to see his wheels turning just by facial expressions. The guy might never get an Oscar, but his performances are almost always memorable.

The young actors all convincingly match their older counterparts,a and I found myself watching the way the young Vic went about his medical work and swing dancing and wondering if I'd be lucky enough to end up that way, as Jack says, "having it figured out."

The ultimate message of the film is as simple and yet profoundly human as the story itself: ending your life is easy, it's the carryin' on that's hard. That's not to say that life is meaningless or awful, but just that you've got to put your heart into it, as Schepisi himself has done here. "Last Orders" and "Lantana" are two of the best unknown films out there right now. Check 'em out.

It would be hard to imagine a finer troupe of actors than those assembled for the very believable "Last Orders." An ensemble that meshes so well that I was drawn into the screen barely conscious of their real identities and filmography, the story of the long ride of a man's cremated ashes to his selected disposal site, Margate (of all places - garish, timeworn, solidly tired) is gripping.

Through flashbacks to events both recent and as far back as combat in the North African desert in World War II the story of three close friends, the wife of one and their son (and peripherally but not insignificantly their catastrophically mentally retarded daughter) reflects the daily small joys and not great setbacks of very average English people. All the characters here could well be neighbors of the folks in "The Full Monty," people whose days are locally if unspectacularly productive and whose pleasures center in daily convivial meetings at the local pub.

Jack (Michael Caine) faces death more bravely and honestly than he ever did his total rejection of his and his wife's (Helen Mirren) daughter. His disappointment at his son's refusal to join him in the butcher business has been the lot of many. An American version of this tragic rejection would have the son spurn the family business for acting or law or medicine or the Presidency. Jack's son is quite happy to sell cars. A nice touch of English class reality.

Jack's ashes make a number of detours enroute to Margate while his widow pursues her own very necessary and moving journey to personal closure and the prospect of future happiness. At each stop the relations between the four men in the borrowed Mercedes become more interwoven, detailed and - ultimately - important for each as their mission nears accomplishment.

The direction is superb as is the muted, sometimes hazy cinematography. Unfortunately, as is so often the case with even the best cast portraying non-Oxbridge types, some speech is indecipherable. Ray Winstone is the chief malefactor in the mumbles competition but his acting is convincing - a fine actor from whom much can be expected. An elderly woman leaving the theater near me remarked, "This wasn't about a Gosford Park - the film needed subtitles." Yes, we have our class consciousness on the Upper West Side too.

This is a very special film that deserves the widest distribution. It won't get it though, not here. If you can't see it in a theater, rent it when it becomes available.

Last orders is a very simple movie. It is based upon one of cinema's simplest genres: The Road Movie. It is about simple people who lead simple lives wherein very little happens very often. But behind this simplicity lies the dreams and desires and mistakes and wasted opportunities of these simple people. Small things (relatively speaking) which would seem to have little consequence on the outside world; but then, we all live in a much smaller world - don't we - and even the tiniest broken dream can sometimes leave us empty - if only for a moment.

This is a film then about people. About how people view each other. About how people can harbour the most powerful emotions or secrets - or both - without even those closest to them having the faintest idea. About the importance of friendship and the universality of loss: innocence as well as bereavement.

So four simple folk take the ashes of their old mate to be scattered into the sea at faded old, lost innocence Margate. While the deceased's wife - avoiding this trip - visits their estranged, handicapped daughter for the final time. We see how they relate (and related) to their old, dead friend and to each other. We see that great tragedy need not be about 'great' people. We see that pure love need not derive from 'pure' people. We see that life and living and loving are as difficult (and as inspirational) for the simplest of folk. And we celebrate this empathy.

Last Orders is a slow burning film with an occasionally awkward script and a potentially confusing narrative. But for all that, it is a fine, frequently moving, honest piece of cinema. The photography is consistently evocative; the acting is impeccable (Winstone impresses as the stoic son; Hemmings crackles as the bludgeoning, second rate pugilist) and several set pieces are profoundly sincere (the scene in the field is electric); but this is not a film that exists to shine incandescently - only to burn, quietly and slowly, until it says what it has to and the fuse runs out. It's worth staying with because, as simple as these people are, if they can't tell you a little something about the sadness and joy and - above all - the wonderful uncertainty of life... then you're probably already dead.

Funerals/memorial services are probably the last place you want to be after a friend's died. The places you hung out at together seem better monuments than a cemetery or a headstone. And maybe that's where the spirit really rests.

LAST ORDERS is a soft-spoken and beautifully poignant film about the drive to scatter the ashes of a departed friend. Detours to pubs, a war memorial, and the field where he and his wife met stirr the memories of the son and three friends left to carry on. Enduring friendship, fidelity, laughter, and support become the themes of their lives together.

And whereas, in an americain film, this could all turn into a sappy series of flashbacks - Bob Hoskins, Helen Mirren, Micheal Caine, and Ray Winstone perform with all the subtle grace of traditional British cinema.

LAST ORDERS is well worth seeing for anyone.