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.

This film is based on a novel by a man named Swift but rather than being a biting satire, it's a film that only a person with a heart of stone could sit through wihtout breaking into tears. While the novel was praised largely for it's experimental style, it's the tenderness and humanity that make this film memorable.

Wonderfully acted by Michael Caine, helen Mirren, Bob Hoskins and others, it tells the tale of a London butcher's journey to his final resting place and a composite picture of his life is gradually drawn by the people who take him there. his story covers 70 years of british history which are lovingly recreated, but it's the personalities that are striking rather than the historical events that shape their lives. The film has moments of almost sublime beauty and pathos. It's a film that reminds us that, no matter how trivial our lives seem, we still have an impact on those around us.

Those of us who lament the decline of British cinema into a quagmire of Gangster flicks and rom-coms will embrace this film like a long-lost relative.

In London, in a pub, the friends Vic Tucker (Tom Courtney), owner of a funerary agency, the former boxer Lenny (David Hemmings) and the gambler Ray Johnson (Bob Hoskins) gathers with Vince Dodds (Ray Winstone), the owner of a `showroom', to accomplish the last wish of his father and local butcher Jack Dodds (Michael Caine): to throw his ashes in the sea, in Margate. His wife Amy (Helen Mirren) delivered a note to Ray, where Jack expressed his last desire. Along their journey in a Mercedes Benz, the story of their lives is disclosed through flashbacks or thoughts, where deep secrets are revealed to the viewers along 109 minutes of this excellent film. The cast of this movie is outstanding and their performances are fantastic. There are many subplots and in the end, all the characters are very well developed though their personal dramas, recollections and dialogs. A touching movie about friendship, revelations and farewell, and highly recommended for sensitive persons. My vote is nine.

Title (Brazil): `O Último Adeus' (`The Last Goodbye')

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.

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.