The Last Resort

The Last Stand would have fit right in among the action movies of late 1980s and early ‘90s, or the vertex of Arnold Schwarzenegger's career. It follows their formula to a tee, with Arnold playing a former big-city cop who's now settled into the quiet life as a small-town sheriff. When some really bad guys pass through town, he must resort to his erstwhile role as a bad*ss enforcer and show them who's boss. This entails, among other things, operating a minigun, shooting guys in the head while jumping off buildings, and driving recklessly through a corn field. It also means Arnold's character can withstand getting stabbed in the leg about a half dozen times, yet still manage to walk without a limp.

The late ‘80s/early ‘90s flourished with movies like this, and because many of them worked as mindless entertainment back then, there's no reason to think they can't work now. After all, it wasn't the era that made these kinds of movies fun and exciting, but rather their ridiculous content and larger-than-life heroes, namely Schwarzenegger, who still have a place in the action movie landscape, and probably always will.

What's changed, of course, is Schwarzenegger is now 20 years older. We're aware of that and the writers of The Last Stand are aware of that. The screenplay specifically caters to the idea of an aging lawman forced out of his comfort zone to do battle with a bunch of younger, more technology-driven criminals. There's more than one reference to Arnold's age, but surprisingly the movie doesn't harp on it, at least for too long, and neither do we. Sure, in his first close-up we notice his hair is thinning and he has his fair share of wrinkles (a reminder that he's now 66-years-old), but once the movie hits its stride, we all but forget and realize the former governor of California still has what it takes to be an action star.

The plot is standard-issue for the genre. A Mexican drug lord named Gabriel Cortez (Eduardo Noriega), who's “as dangerous as Pablo Escobar,” escapes FBI custody and speeds toward the Mexican border in his zero one Corvette, which, according to the movie, is the fastest consumer car on the market. It's practically a race car and comes equipped with all sorts of neat features, like a night vision monitor that allows the driver to turn off the headlights and drive in the dark.

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