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Sadly Over-hyped

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties.

If there's one thing the history of cinema has repeatedly pressed upon us, whether consciously or not, it is that physical beauty is superior. From an evolutionary standpoint, this makes perfect sense as it's how we're programmed. We are made to want the best genes for our children in order to ensure that the species continues as fit and healthy as possible, and physical appearance is the most immediate indicator of genetics.We see this again in Luc Bessons 'Le Dernier Combat' (The Last Battle). Pierre Jolivet is our nameless hero, identified in the credits as 'The Man'. Our storyline is a Hollywood standard. Our hero meets up with the nameless antagonist (identified in the credits as 'The Brute') played by Jean Reno, more on him in a moment. Our hero loses the battle, sustaining injuries but managing to escape. He stumbles upon a third nameless character (identified in the credits as 'The Doctor'), and the pair strike up an unlikely friendship while our hero is nursed back to health. Friend of the hero, who is intelligent and sophisticated but genetically inferior, is killed, leaving our hero to face the final showdown, which he naturally wins, leaving him to rule over all while getting the girl. As a French film rather than Hollywood, it's not always quite as simple as this, there are many subtleties and allegories, and all the characters have a kind of comic existentialism.Our hero Jolivet is lithe and toned, with deep, dark searching eyes. In his pursuit of the woman he is refined, presenting a neatly-wrapped gift, combing his hair. Our villain Reno, by contrast, is shown at one stage in his underpants, hairy chest with his belly hanging over. He wears glasses, an indicator of his genetic inferiority, and to further force home the impression he is given facial scarring.Our third character Bouise is the intelligent sophisticate. Painting, cooking, enjoying fine wine, repelling Reno with the wry humour of his multiple defensive barriers. He is older, weaker. He has glasses and funny teeth, but is apparently aware of his inferior position and doesn't attempt to impose himself on the woman. His role is the facilitator for our hero. When he removes our hero's blindfold, indicating he can now visit the woman without restriction, our facilitator is symbolically sacrificing himself for the hero, which is made literal a few moments later when he is killed by falling debris on the way.As a Hollywood film, this wouldn't have been anything special. But it's French, so we instead have many delights in store. Reno's character is not given the Hollywood villain treatment, despite his apparently psychopathic single-minded desire to destroy everyone in sight. The roles are instead enforced in more comedic ways; Jolivet takes a double hob to attach to his gas canister, but when Reno repels him and is sitting at his symbolic throne, not only does the gas run out, but the tape recorder which has worked perfectly up until now suddenly decides to break down, not by running out of batteries but by inexplicably chewing up the cassette. Reno is such a wonderful and likable actor that we are never entirely against him. Similarly, our hero is never entirely heroic; in the film's first scene we are shown him having sex with a blow-up doll, only to be foiled in his designs by a deflation.Another thing Hollywood would and could never have done is to make an entire film containing only one word of dialogue, a broken "bon.... jour" which is spoken by Bouise and Jolivet to each other. We are dropped into a post-apocalyptic world where nothing is explained (which is as it should be, I feel), least of all why people are now incapable of speech, except in that one moment under the influence of some inhalation. Bouise is the symbol of the old world, civilisation, empathy, artistry. Our hero is shocked to hear speech, but desperately wants to join; the jubilation when he is finally able to is quite touching. In his spare time, our hero appears to enjoy listening to music and looking at paintings, compared to Reno's pursuit of practicing smashing bottles with a sword. While our hero dines on cooked fillets, Reno is seen stuffing raw fish into a bubble gum dispenser. The aforementioned scene of gas and tape recorder failure can be viewed as Reno's attempt to join that civilised world, but his brute ignorance leads to inevitable failure; he cannot be what he isn't. He is the barbarian trying to assume the role of King.The remaining world is one of shattered buildings and improvised weaponry, apparently engulfed by a vast desert. Our hero is seen early on with a lance with a knife tied to the end of it, and some padded 'armour'. Reno has similar padded protection and wanders around with a sword. Even Bouise comes out to attack Reno at the gate wielding an improvised crossbow. All this medieval weaponry lends itself neatly to Bouise painting our hero in the guise of a knight on the wall. Later, Bouise adds the female figure; is this to suggest the chivalric approach he would like our hero to take with the woman? If so, the wrapped gift suggests that it has worked, leading to Bouise's approval with the blindfold removal. In the end he doesn't get the girl, as Reno has gotten to her first, and apparently killed her in his insane villainy.We are then given a final scene of our hero flying back to his original location. Here he kills the leader and assumes command, dressed no longer as the noble knight, but now in the clothes reflecting the position he will take here... the white suit of a gangster. But he's still our noble hero because he immediately frees the bizarre gimp-like water slave, and is rewarded by being lead to a woman. They both smile, and we have our happy ending.

Shot entirely in black and white and set in a barely inhabited post- apocalyptic world where the atmosphere has rendered humanity mute, Luc Besson's feature length début was nothing short of ambitious. The plot ostensibly follows The Man as he scavenges for parts to keep his light aircraft in repair - venturing out into the wasteland he stumbles across a hospital where he meets The Doctor, a man living in fear of The Brute (played by Jean Reno) who is attempting to gain entry to the hospital and kill the Doctor. Through non-verbal communication, The Man and The Doctor come to help each other in an attempt to survive and keep The Brute at bay. Despite the innovative premise and stark, stylish beauty of Besson's direction, the film moves at an odd pace whereby it's more confusion and intrigue that keeps the viewer watching, rather than for any substance of character or story. The daring decision to have next to no intelligible dialogue throughout doesn't help matters, as the viewer is left to piece together the characters motives without explanation, but it's the score (the epitome of awful 80's synth soundtracks) more than anything else that dates the film and hindered this viewers enjoyment. While still worth checking out for any fans of Besson, the post-apocalyptic genre and cinema in general, it's not the easiest of films to watch, but one that rewards the viewer in spades through Besson's fantastic direction.

If you expect that this movie is full of action and grabbing you from the start then don't watch it. But if you like those kind of meditative movies which stick in your mind for a while, until you get the details, then you will love it. Now don't get me wrong there is action and there are things going on just not in the usual way. Basically the plot is in a post-apocalyptic world where anyone fights in his (or their) way for survival. In this fight they lost the ability to speak... I don't want to write more to not spoil the movie for you, but trust me if you like SF-authors like Lem or Capec or even some from Orson Scott Card you will love this movie.

This is probably the most uninvolving film I've ever seen. I watched it because I have a soft spot for Leon (everything else Besson has done has been just awful, in my opinion, with the exception of the script for Wasabi) and Jean Reno. It's a testament to just how bad this film is that Reno, one of the most charismatic and effortlessly affable actors (admittedly he's just starting out here) can't make this film, or the moments in which he is on screen, watchable.It's all very film-schooly: black and white, no dialogue, people doing things for no apparent reason, people chasing each other while in turn being chased by a shaky camera. And, predictably, none of it is entertaining.It's not a "French Mad Max" as some people have claimed (actually, I think they mean "Mad Max 2") - that is a superficial comparison based only on the fact that both films have a post-apocalyptic setting, and is just the kind of comment you'd expect from someone who doesn't know what they're talking about. Mad Max 2 was pulsating, Mad Max 2 was exciting, Mad Max 2 was worth your time - Le Dernier Combat is none of these.I know it's supposed to be cool to like arty black-and-white French films and equally cool to say you saw something in them that other people did not (or you managed to sit through it without feeling drowsy), which is why I wouldn't trust anyone who claims to like Le Dernier Combat, because I see nothing of worth in it whatsoever; it asks for so much and gives nothing back. I found myself drifting from it after about five minutes and it never did anything to regain my full attention. Anyone who can sit through it undistracted isn't human, or, at the very most, is psychotic. (Actually, they're probably just trying to seem "cool").