 |
  
Your Gateway to Music and More from a Christian Perspective Slow down as you approach the gate, and have your change ready.... |
|
Your Gateway to Music and More from a Christian Perspective Slow down as you approach the gate, and have your change ready.... |
| Subscribe
About Us Features News Album
Reviews
|
The
Last Place On Earth
Stars: Dana Ashbrook, Tisha Campbell-Martin, Mitchell Anderson, Thom Bierdz, Matt Farnsworth, Billy Dee Williams, Brock Peters, Anita Finlay, Barry Wyatt, Phyllis Diller, and Boomer Director/Scriptwriter: James Slocum Music: Eric Swanson Boss Entertainment Running Time: 90 minutes Unrated (possibly R for language and partial nudity) The Last Place On Earth is an earnest film effort, but ends up a watered down version of Love Story. The main characters, Rob and Ann (Dana Ashbrook and Tisha Campbell-Martin), are the opposites that are supposed to attract. He is bland and she is irritating. Yes, we find out that she is ill and yes, he just lost his mother (Phyllis Diller), but the dialogue is flat and the acting, with the exception of Campbell-Martin, consists of reciting lines. The soundtrack by Eric Swanson promotes a single, “Star of Love,” and its music video even appears at the end. The story begins at the hospital where Rob’s mother (Diller) is dying of cancer. She tells him that your love is in the spirals, which can have several connotations and this drags on through the film. After her death---and before Rob can collect his inheritance---Mom’s ashes must be scattered at a special canyon in the Southwest. It is on this road trip that Rob meets Ann (Campbell-Martin) and her dog, Boomer when her car breaks down and he gives her a lift. Ann is a forceful presence, used to getting her way. She is a lawyer turned caterer and he works in a bank for a dolt of a boss. You can see the rest of the story a mile away. They fall in love, marry, and then her health becomes an issue. This is a bi-racial love story and acceptance is shown through Ann’s friendship with a gay couple, and the fact that her stepmother was Japanese. Ann’s father is played by the wonderful Brock Peters who isn’t in the film nearly enough. And who would be lucky enough to have a doctor like Billy Dee Williams? Tisha Campbell-Martin walks off with the film; mainly because of the tough attitude she projects with her acting. Phyllis Diller may be unrecognizable in the hospital setting, but her lines are memorable. Dana Ashbrook’s Rob is one-dimensional. You can catch a glance of soap opera star Mark Consuelos in a dinner scene and Mink Stole as the leader of a cancer support group. There are short scenes that do bring some light to this film, one of which is Ann enticing Rob to skinny dip in a mountain pool and Rob’s interactions with his insensitive boss at the bank. The film seems a travelogue for visiting the desert southwest and Carmel-by-the-Sea. The dinner party that Ann caters with Rob’s help is interesting, but makes you wonder just who would be preparing food with long silver fingernails and where they got the camping equipment for a night in the woods? Their sudden decision to get married is cute (wedding meal is fast food and her bouquet a handful of wildflowers), but Ann’s character is so excitable that it is with a sigh of relief when Rob finally tells her off. I think doing this earlier in the film would have allowed for better development of the supporting cast, which is wasted. Sadly, the film ends up being a soap opera in the desert. Copyright 2004 Marie Asner Submitted 5/17/04 
|
|
|
|
