Tuesday, August 18, 2015

Movie Review: "The Last Stand" (2013)

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Movie"The Last Stand"
Director: Jee-woon Kim
Year: 2013
Rating: R
Running Time: 1 hour, 47 minutes

When drug cartel leader Gabriel Cortez (Eduardo Noriega) busts out of his prison transport in Las Vegas on the way to his execution, he speeds away in a modified Corvette and makes a run for the border. His path leads through a small town on the US/Mexico border called Sommerton Junction. The only thing that stands between Cortez and freedom is Sheriff Ray Owen (Arnold Schwarzenegger) and his rag tag group of inexperienced deputies, who must make a stand against Cortez and his hired army to prevent him from crossing the border.  

More Arnold Schwarzenegger movies? All will be clear very soon.

This movie flew under the radar for us when it came out in the theater initially. We saw the trailers for it, but it never really piqued our interest. Hey, we had to be a little more discriminating when it came to shelling out money for movies!! With what he have seen from Schwarzenegger recently in his film career with movies such as "Sabotage" and his most recent borderline flop "Terminator Genisys," we figured Arnold's best days were long gone and far behind him, since he hadn't done an enjoyable movie for quite some time. We have to say, "The Last Stand" was a fun, enjoyable action flick that far exceeded our very low expectations. This movie is a throwback to Arnold's hay-day as a huge action star, drawing its inspiration from such films like "Commando" and "True Lies," without all the super spy stuff. Much like these films, what happens is not all that possible and much of it is over the top, but we really don't care after watching over a dozen Arnold flicks in the last month. The story is not one of great depth, and in fact, it's an extremely simple premise interwoven with cheesy dialogue, but we'll be damned if it isn't a wild, satisfying ride.

Arnold Schwarzenegger plays Ray Owen, a former L.A. cop who has seen some terrible things in his career. Wanting to move on after a bad experience, Ray becomes a small-town sheriff for some peace and quiet. He is joined by his deputies Mike, played by Luiz Guzmán, Sarah, played by Jamie Alexander, and Jerry, played Zach Gilford, none of which have seen any action in their town other than dealing with the occasional drunk and disorderly conduct. Ray also appoints a couple locals as deputies to help with the coming threat first is Frank played by Rodrigo Santoro who is ex-military  and ex-boyfriend of Sarah's who just spent a weekend in the drunk tank. Second is Lewis Dinkum, played by Johnny Knoxville, who is a little bit off his rocket, but does keep a rather large arsenal of weapons under the guise that he runs a historical gun museum. The museum is only open a couple hours a month, but it's enough for him to get his hands on some otherwise outlawed, sometimes gigantic weapons. When Cortez's mercenaries, led by Burrell, played by Peter Stormare, get to Sommerton to clear a path, it results in a fire fight between these mercenaries and the police in a hard R-rated, bloody action-packed romp. This is the kind of movie we are used to seeing from an Arnold, the aforementioned popcorn action flick with an eventual ultimate final showdown between Cortez and Owen. Much like "The Fast and the Furious" series this movie knows it isn't meant to be taken seriously and so we can enjoy it and suspend our disbelief long enough to kick up or feet and have a mindless good time for a breezy hour and 47 minutes.

My Rating: 7.5/10
BigJ's Rating: 7/10
IMDB's Rating: 6.4/10
Rotten Tomatoes Rating: 60%
Do we recommend this movie: Sure, why not?
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One year ago, we were watching: "The Interrupters"

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