The Last Tycoon

What a mystery THE LAST TYCOON has been. This is a large-scale film with perhaps the greatest cast of male actors in history and nary a mention is made of it. Most critics bash it, the common viewer may dismiss it, but you cannot deny its place in history. It is not often you will find such a pool of talent AND a movie with both Robert De Niro and Jack Nicholson on screen together. They even FIGHT! By the way, THE LAST TYCOON also happens to be an excellent, if flawed, work of art.

Director Elia Kazan (GENTLEMEN'S AGREEMENT, ON THE WATERFRONT) and company have taken F. Scott Fitzgerald's unfinished novel about the politics and personal conflicts of 1930's Hollywood and put forth an off-beat, unusual picture. Kazan is one of only three directors to successfully direct motion pictures between the 1940's on through the 1970's (the other 2 being Hitchcock and Huston). A staggeringly legendary cast play their parts effectively instead of just calling in their performances, which easily could have happened. Perhaps there was some competition between the old school actors and their methods (Mitchum, Milland, Andrews, Curtis, Pleasence to name a few) and the "method" actors like De Niro or Nicholson who symbolically take the torch in this film. This is especially true of De Niro's extraordinary lead as "Monroe Stahr" (based on Irving Thalberg). Kazan helped to create the "method" acting concept, so who better to direct such a crossroad of talent.

"Monroe Stahr" is a no nonsense "Studio Chief" who I'm sure Fitzgerald encountered while a hack writer in Hollywood during his final years. De Niro as "Stahr" orders cuts here and fires directors there and caters to what he thinks audiences want. He is actually a noble character, something Fitzgerald may not have meant to express. He must deal with Robert Mitchum and Ray Milland, who represent the corporate, artless side of the picture business and later the writer's wing (represented by Mr. Nicholson). As expected, there are many conflicts of interest but the movie's magic lies in the amazing contrast Kazan and company make between the dream world of an old black and white movie and what happened when the director yelled "CUT".

I love classic black and white films and one of the aspects that made them so great was the world you were thrust into. Fake backdrops, miniatures, and grand sets surrounded the actors in most of them, but the dream-like quality of a black and white film kept you involved. With this film, some curiously familiar "fictional" film clips are used for screening purposes where the studio executives would clap or claw at what was projected (They were filmed specifically for this film). Kazan and co. create scenes from supposed films (one was CASABLANCA turned inside out) to add some realism to it all. We get to see an actor from the movies-within-the-movie "on" and "off-screen". Tony Curtis has some good early scenes as a perfect screen presence, but an awfully inept star "off-screen" when he meets with De Niro to confess his sexual confusion in real life. You'll know what I mean if you see the flick for yourself.

LAST TYCOON is a love story more than anything. Many people may dismiss the love angle as a distraction. I found it slightly hypnotic and mysterious. The love interest, played by a beautiful actress named Ingrid Boulting, is great at exuding an elusive quality, something the De Niro character can't put his finger on. It all leads up to a somewhat vague climax and ending, but perhaps the filmmakers were unable to come up with the final stamp Fitzgerald failed to accomplish himself.

This is a film for discerning and patient film-goers only. It is unlike anything I have ever seen before. That is why I see movies. Why the film has been so looked over is bizarre. Even if you consider it a complete flop, it deserves recognition, if only for the great cast. If you like classic films and know a thing or two about film history, you may know why THE LAST TYCOON is so captivating.

RATING: 8 1/2 of 10

De Niro was an unexpected surprise as Monroe Starr in this brilliant adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's unfinished last novel. He gives a thoughtful, sensitive, and intelligent performance as this character, who was modeled on MGM producer, Irving Thalberg. Fitzgerald wrote about Hollywood from the inside, and from the perspective of someone who was destroying himself by being inside. He could ask for nothing better than to have English playwright Harold Pinter create this stark, human screenplay and then have Elia Kazan realize it.

In addition to De Niro's definitive performance, we get a series of perfect cameos (usually an impossibility) from Tony Curtis, Jeanne Moreau, Robert Mitchum, and others. We also get two screen debuts of merit -- Angelica Huston (in a small, but memorable scene) and an excellent Teresa Russell as Starr's would-be sweetheart. The critics hated the movie, and it did poorly in box offices, but it was truly, like Fitzgerald himself, an American masterpiece.

Elia Kazan's The Last Tycoon is a very good film and well worth seeing. The absolute top reason to see it is for Robert DeNiro's outstanding performance, a reminder why he's the greatest American actor of his generation. The movie has many other fine performances, from a long list of big stars, that also make it a treat. Chief among those fine supporting performances was Theresa Russell's film debut. She was a nuanced and convincing. The film is also beautiful, with great period sets, excellent cinematography, and many close-ups of distinctive faces that told their stories without words. The film's structure, pacing, imagery (the unfinished beach house) and editing were also pleasing, and conveyed respect for the film and for the audience.

All that said, The Last Tycoon feels somehow unsatisfying, and surely did not reach the heights of greatness to be expected from a collaboration of Fitzgerald, Spiegel, Kazan and Pinter, on a big budget and with a dozen major stars. My own speculation is that the movie makers were too familiar with the details of Fitzgerald's story, and as they cut scenes and made changes they forgot to look at their work from the perspective of a moviegoer who has not read the novel and does not know the story.

Films about the film industry tend to be self-mocking at the best of times. Singin' in the Rain poked fun at the coming of sound and outlined the difficulties it brought to the industry amongst a love story and a few other things. Additionaly,the more contemporary The Player brought to our attention the trials and tribulations of a Hollywood film producer as he struggles to balance everything at once, complete with disgruntled rejected writers. So it's sort of a shame as well as a surprise that The Last Tycoon does not hit as many spots as I thought it might with it ending up as a slow burning but ultimately unrewarding experience.

The film adopts an approach that makes it come across as more of a love story than anything else, but there is a sub-narrative involved that revolves around De Niro's character of Monroe Stahr gradually getting more and more confused with his life and things around him. The primary problem here is the film is not involving enough to warrant it an interesting or touching love story and the dedication to the focus of a man slowly getting more and more overwhelmed is undercooked – both are there and done reasonably well but both feel anti-climatic. Along with this and like I said in the opening paragraph, the film does not poke fun at and nor does it reference enough the industry in which it's set so it doesn't feel particularly clever, something Singin' in the Rain and The Player were because they did it very well and to good comic effect.

There is a definite study going on here with some substance in the sense it is about Stahr and his struggles with his current life and his love for newly acquired girlfriend Kathleen Moore (Boulting) but nothing much else. Is it a romance? Probably, but is it a good romance? Not really. Ingrid Boulting is shot in an extremely objective manner with lots of brightly lit shots and compositions that reveal enough of her body at particularly nicely timed incidences in the film. This is twinned with several close ups of De Niro's facial expressions in which the lust and desire is very much apparent. It would be easy to argue that these objective and obvious set ups revolving around a gaze of some sort are deliberate given the film is about film-making and that very early on there is a scene involving a man and woman shooting a romantic scene of some sort. But the concentration on a genuine romance between two characters in the story we're watching is clearly trying to come across as serious and thus; being self-aware of its own compositions is an idea the film fails to get across.

But before this romantic distraction gets involved, the film begins in a light-hearted but intriguing style. An individual answers a question on how difficult it must be to shoot an earthquake scene and they laugh, replying that shaking the camera usually works and insulting the idea as a cheap effect. Sure enough about ten minutes later, there is an earthquake within the universe of The Last Tycoon and we realise the film is poking fun at itself. Then there is the other concentrated dig early on that, unfortunately, isn't played on an awful lot and that involves Tony Curtis' character Rodriguez and Tony Curtis as a whole. The character name of Rodriguez is short and sharp – it is exotic in the sense it sounds 'Latino' and we all know that 'Latinos' in Hollywood cinema are usually scorching hot in their appearance (at least the women are). Rodriguez is an actor who appears in lots of films about love and making love; he appears topless in the scenes within the scenes that Tony Curtis is filming. The point here being that Curtis himself is (or was) a bit of a pin-up and his public figure is being spoofed through him playing the part of a romantic lead in a film within a film.

When all is said and done, The Last Tycoon is a study of one man and his issues. It is not as engrossing as De Niro's own Taxi Driver from the same year and nor is it as interesting or disturbing as more contemporary examples like American Psycho and One Hour Photo. The film substitutes daily rigmarole and movie set interaction for the introduction of Boulting as the dull love interest and shoots her body accordingly. Twinned with this is a visit from Brimmer, played by Jack Nicholson, which is ill timed and feels out of place given the route the film had gone down at that point. While the film isn't particularly bad, it feels underdone and somewhat one dimensional. Its study of love and stress is alright but it does not demonise the film industry in ways it could've and nor does it feel particularly urgent. This could revolve around anyone, in any industry, at any time and that said, The Last Tycoon is pretty ordinary.

This movie is worth watching for Theresa Russell alone.Ok the rest of the cast are all very good but a heart rending role from Theresa Russell steals the film,you can see her mind working and her face is a picture in every sense.At the start of her career to be in a scene with De niro and Nicholson and walk away with it,is something worth watching.A very moving and affecting work by an actress in a worthwhile film.