[yasr_overall_rating]
An aging, former movie star is forced to face the reality that his glory days are behind him. On its surface, “The Last Movie Star” is a tale about faded fame, but at its core, it’s a universal story about growing old.
Burt Reynolds was Hollywood’s golden boy throughout the ’70s and part of the ’80s. With such huge hits as “Deliverance,” “Smokey and the Bandit,” “Hooper,” “Smokey and the Bandit II,” “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas,” and the two “Cannonball” movies, he seemed unstoppable. But that is exactly what he became in the mid-eighties. His choice of films became questionable and slowly but surely, his movies went straight to home video where he stayed until 1997 when Paul Thomas Anderson cast him as an aging pornographic filmmaker in his breakout feature, “Boogie Nights,” which also starred Mark Wahlberg. With an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor, he seemed to be back in the eye of Hollywood’s elite but sadly, while he continued to make movies, he never achieved the same level of success he did back in the ’70s and early ’80s.
In “The Last Movie Star,” Reynolds plays Vic Edwards, an aging actor who is now in his eighties and who was once the toast of Hollywood but has not had a hit movie in decades. Sound familiar? With this film, it’s obvious that director Adam Rifkin offered it to Burt Reynolds as a love-letter to his career and Reynolds, to his credit, doesn’t just phone in his performance, he has actually never been better and brought a tear to this critic’s eyes. Reynolds is pretty much playing himself here and it works as we get to know this very private character throughout the film’s 90-minute runtime. We discover that Edwards started his career as a stuntman and then gradually worked his way into acting and while he was a huge name throughout the ’70s and ’80s, his star has waned over the years and now at eighty-plus years old, he lives by himself in a big house in Brentwood along with his dog.
When he receives an invitation from the International Nashville Film Festival, where they plan on awarding him with their lifetime achievement award, he blows it off until he talks to his old friend Sonny (Chevy Chase), who convinces him to attend. Begrudgingly, he decides to go but when he reaches Nashville, instead of a big limo waiting to pick him up, he is greeted by Lil McDougal (Ariel Winter), the sister of the film festival’s creator, Doug (Clark Duke), wearing cut-off shorts, a low-cut tee shirt, and an attitude to boot. When they leave the airport, they do so in an old beat-up car that is borderline dead. Lil curses and swears at her boyfriend on her cell phone and then drops Vic off at a rundown motel, stating she’ll be back later to take him to the festival. That evening, anticipating a movie theater in which a selection of his films will be shown, Vic arrives at a bar where a small room in the back has been set up as the festival’s screening room. Doug and his film festival partner, Shane (Ellar Coltrane), greet him enthusiastically, along with a large crowd of fans but Vic, still living in the past when he was flown all around the world and picked up in limos to appear on Johnny Carson, decides he’s had enough of amateur hour and goes back to his motel with the intent of leaving the next day.
Lil comes by in the morning to take him to the airport but at the last minute, Vic changes his mind and has her drive him all over town. As it turns out, he was born and raised in Nashville. He visits the house where he grew up, the football stadium where he played in college until an injury put a stop to it, and he then he stops by a nursing home where his one true love now resides. As he takes a trip down memory lane, Lil, who is very self-obsessed, slowly begins to take a liking to him, and he to her. By the end of the trip, Vic finally comprehends that his heyday has come and gone, and comes to the realization that Doug and Shane and all of his fans are who are most important in his life, they are the ones who hold him up on a pedestal and watch his films religiously. He finally accepts their lifetime achievement award and heads back to California, where he proudly displays it on his mantlepiece.
It’s a conventional story and you know exactly how it is going to end after the first few minutes but getting there is half the fun. The film cleverly inserts footage of Reynolds when he appeared on TV with Johnny Carson at the height of his fame and because they cut out any reference to his real name, it actually sits with you better than watching a CGI representation of the actor when he was younger. Pretty much everything in the movie relates to Burt Reynolds in real life, the football injury that prevented him from going pro, starting out in the film industry as a stuntman and then working his way up the ladder to Hollywood heavyweight, it’s all in there and because there are some fictional elements thrown into the mix, you can’t always tell when fact stops and fiction begins. One of the most touching scenes is when Vic stops by the nursing home where his first wife, and one true love, is now living. He sits with her and opens up about how much of an ass he was in the past for leaving her and their daughter when he became a big star and you can’t help but wonder if there is any comparison to Reynolds’ real life. What makes the scene even more tragic, is that she is suffering from Alzheimer’s and can’t remember anything of what he says but even though she can’t recall, we still empathize with Vic and realize that though we all make mistakes, owning up to them is what helps us grow and mature.
I loved this movie. It felt like I was looking at a documentary about Mr. Reynolds’ life in the guise of a fictional film and watching him reminisce about his past, intercut with real-life footage of him with Johnny Carson on TV, was priceless. I also loved how director Adam Rifkin played up the importance of Doug and Shane and their small film festival. As an indie filmmaker and movie critic for over 30 years, I once toyed with the idea of setting up my own film festival but then realized I wouldn’t be able to successfully achieve all three and made a pass but the amount of time, energy, and money that goes into starting a festival, is huge. Even Sundance had to start somewhere and watching Doug and Shane’s festival get off the ground, was encouraging. Like many of the characters throughout the movie who didn’t know who Vic Edwards was, I’m sure there are many people in the world who do not know who Burt Reynolds is and if that is the case, check out his two “Smokey and the Bandit” movies, as well as “The Cannonball Run” and “Deliverance,” those films will show you just how charismatic and larger-than-life Mr. Reynolds once was.
Now available on Blu-ray & DVD from Lionsgate
