Review: Last Action Hero Is A Parody Of Everything That Is Good
- Aug 7, 2017
- 2 min read
Directed by John McTiernan, the man who defined 80's action through both Predator AND Die Hard, Last Action Hero is nothing more than a brutal mockery of the big muscled, over the top movies of one Arnold Schwarzenegger. And it's very strange indeed.
Jack Slater (Schwarzenegger), typical hero cop, is about to confront his nemesis, The Ripper (Tom Noonan). As he leaps to save his son, firing his ridiculous hand gun, the film goes out of focus. You see, Jack Slater is nothing more than a fictional character, the favourite character of one Danny Madigan (Austin O'Brien). When Danny comes into possession of a golden movie ticket, he is warped into the world of Jack Slater, namely during the events of his fourth film. Teaming up with his fictional idol, he sets out to stop the villainous Benedict (Charles Dance) before the movie world breaks into his own.
Last Action Hero is a very long way from being a good movie. And the real kicker? The Jack Slater movies within the movie seem like they'd be a hell of a lot of fun on their own, as well as being the parody the movie tries so hard to be. Between an awful, awful child actor and all manner of absurd happenings ranging from animated humanoid cats to guard dogs that form pyramids, there's a lot of crap to be had.
Schwarzenegger and Dance however, are excellent, playing off of each other in gloriously over the top fashion. It's just a pity that you have to slog through the rest of the movie to get there. It's especially painful when you realise that McTiernan followed up this dumpster fire with the thoroughly enjoyable Die Hard: With A Vengeance.
How the director of some of the worlds best action brought this miserable excuse for a film into the world is beyond me. While Slater and Benedict are great characters, they're saddled alongside nothing but bad. So the question, and the answer, is, to quote the film itself, "To be or not to be? Not to be."
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