Entry tags:
2012-05-22
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif){kind=small}
Entry tags:
[100 Scenes] 7) Last Night (1998): We'll know. It's too big. [NSFW clip]
There is a danger when presenting the last scene of a movie of being greeted with cries of "Spoilers!" I think 1998's Last Night (not to be confused with the recent Keira Knightly vehicle) is a fair exception, however, because its ending is written into its premise: at midnight tonight, the world will end. No explanation of why or how is given, aside from the knowledge that it's always daylight now, even in the dead of night. The people of the world know the end is coming, and when, and have known it for months. The world will not be saved—the government has no grand adventure planned to change the inevitable, and Bruce Willis won't be hopping on a spaceship to stave off the Apocalypse. Not this time.
The movie doesn't really concern itself with the nuts and bolts of Armageddon, however. It's far more concerned with people, and how each of us answers the Big Question: How do you spend what's left of your time? What does your last night on earth look like if you know it's everyone else's last night, too? Some fill it with prayer, or family, or music, or mayhem, or parties, or what comforts come from work, even if that work's purpose is becoming obsolete in minutes. Others decide to fulfill the fantasies they've held at bay for years, be it performing at a concert hall regardless of whether anyone shows up, or having all the sex they ever wanted now that morality and consequence have become moot points. For some, it's best to be alone. For some, even one night is too long to wait. Another question: What happens when our conflicting wishes for our last moments collide? (Clip briefly not safe for work:)
[Error: unknown template video]
We meet several people during Last Night, but at the center of our view finder is the widower Patrick, played by Canadian actor Don McKellar, who also wrote and directed the film. He has planned his evening around listening to music, drinking wine, thinking about his late wife, and most importantly being alone. The alone part is scuttled by Sandra (Sandra Oh), a woman stranded and desperately trying to get in touch with her husband, who is somewhere on the other end of Toronto. They have a plan, you see—terrified by an end that is out of their control, they intend to take control back by killing themselves together at the very last second. But now she can't make it home in time and can't get him on the phone, and all of Patrick's attempts to help are to no avail. As time begins to run out, the two strangers, one who only wanted to be with the man she loved and one who didn't want to have any human contact at all, realize they will be spending their last moments together, and he agrees to join her suicide pact.
This leads to one of the most bizarre closing shots I can remember seeing in a dramatic film: while one of Patrick's childhood favorite records, Pete Seeger's version of "Guantanamera," plays in the background, the two sit on his apartment building rooftop, each with a handgun pointed at the other's temple as the camera traces circles around them all of us waiting for what we all know is coming. She reminds him to wait for the last possible moment, not a moment sooner; "How will I know?" he asks, and she insists, "You'll know." And therein lies the brilliance of the scene. A film whose ending has been preordained and promised from the first frames risks losing suspense and emotional investment; watching them wait makes us wait with them, and makes us (perhaps like them) grip onto that tiniest thread of hope that this is all a mistake, that the world will survive after all, even when we know in our heart of hearts that it won't. And even when we've come to terms with the inevitable, we still hold our breath for the question that won't be answered until the very, very end: will they pull the trigger or won't they?
As the countdown approaches zero, we see glimpses of those we've met on the way, revisiting Patrick's family comforting themselves with thoughts of their Lord, his sex-obsessed friend coupling with the virgin who will be his final conquest, and others, all of them deep in their own moments, the ones they'll be carrying into the final seconds. But we keep coming back to Patrick and Sandra, the one story whose ending we don't know yet. Will they pull the trigger or won't they? Rather than give the answer, which you can discover for yourself by watching, I'll instead ask yet another question, for a movie with a thousand questions and not nearly enough answers: if the end of the world were upon you, and you've just spent several minutes staring into the eyes of a stranger who is just as frightened and vulnerable as you are, and in whose hands you've placed your life as surely as they've placed theirs in yours, would you—could you, even—take that life that was handed to you, or would your fear take you somewhere else? Last question: When faced with the inevitable beyond your control, is loving those near you perhaps the greatest act of defiance you can name?
The movie doesn't really concern itself with the nuts and bolts of Armageddon, however. It's far more concerned with people, and how each of us answers the Big Question: How do you spend what's left of your time? What does your last night on earth look like if you know it's everyone else's last night, too? Some fill it with prayer, or family, or music, or mayhem, or parties, or what comforts come from work, even if that work's purpose is becoming obsolete in minutes. Others decide to fulfill the fantasies they've held at bay for years, be it performing at a concert hall regardless of whether anyone shows up, or having all the sex they ever wanted now that morality and consequence have become moot points. For some, it's best to be alone. For some, even one night is too long to wait. Another question: What happens when our conflicting wishes for our last moments collide? (Clip briefly not safe for work:)
[Error: unknown template video]
We meet several people during Last Night, but at the center of our view finder is the widower Patrick, played by Canadian actor Don McKellar, who also wrote and directed the film. He has planned his evening around listening to music, drinking wine, thinking about his late wife, and most importantly being alone. The alone part is scuttled by Sandra (Sandra Oh), a woman stranded and desperately trying to get in touch with her husband, who is somewhere on the other end of Toronto. They have a plan, you see—terrified by an end that is out of their control, they intend to take control back by killing themselves together at the very last second. But now she can't make it home in time and can't get him on the phone, and all of Patrick's attempts to help are to no avail. As time begins to run out, the two strangers, one who only wanted to be with the man she loved and one who didn't want to have any human contact at all, realize they will be spending their last moments together, and he agrees to join her suicide pact.
This leads to one of the most bizarre closing shots I can remember seeing in a dramatic film: while one of Patrick's childhood favorite records, Pete Seeger's version of "Guantanamera," plays in the background, the two sit on his apartment building rooftop, each with a handgun pointed at the other's temple as the camera traces circles around them all of us waiting for what we all know is coming. She reminds him to wait for the last possible moment, not a moment sooner; "How will I know?" he asks, and she insists, "You'll know." And therein lies the brilliance of the scene. A film whose ending has been preordained and promised from the first frames risks losing suspense and emotional investment; watching them wait makes us wait with them, and makes us (perhaps like them) grip onto that tiniest thread of hope that this is all a mistake, that the world will survive after all, even when we know in our heart of hearts that it won't. And even when we've come to terms with the inevitable, we still hold our breath for the question that won't be answered until the very, very end: will they pull the trigger or won't they?
As the countdown approaches zero, we see glimpses of those we've met on the way, revisiting Patrick's family comforting themselves with thoughts of their Lord, his sex-obsessed friend coupling with the virgin who will be his final conquest, and others, all of them deep in their own moments, the ones they'll be carrying into the final seconds. But we keep coming back to Patrick and Sandra, the one story whose ending we don't know yet. Will they pull the trigger or won't they? Rather than give the answer, which you can discover for yourself by watching, I'll instead ask yet another question, for a movie with a thousand questions and not nearly enough answers: if the end of the world were upon you, and you've just spent several minutes staring into the eyes of a stranger who is just as frightened and vulnerable as you are, and in whose hands you've placed your life as surely as they've placed theirs in yours, would you—could you, even—take that life that was handed to you, or would your fear take you somewhere else? Last question: When faced with the inevitable beyond your control, is loving those near you perhaps the greatest act of defiance you can name?