The Last Castle

It's an even rarer pleasure to see a film that combines exciting action with a smart, well-informed script and vivid yet restrained performances.

Engrossing if standard-issue prison drama.

A disappointingly pedestrian prison meller that falls between stools artistically and politically.

Robert Redford does everything but wear a crown of thorns as the selfless war hero of The Last Castle, a heavy-handed military prison melodrama.

Ruffalo, actually, who was so perfect in the little-seen "You Can Count On Me," is the only real reason to sit through The Last Castle.

Redford underacts, Gandolfini overacts, and this movie is directed with the same air of unreality, the same grim passion for cliches, both cinematic and emotional, that Lurie brought to his first film, "The Contender."

Plays out like "Cool Hand Luke" meets "Attica," and it's quite the silliest thing.

Decent movie. Kind of old school where prison guards mistreat thier prisoners. The prisoners devise a plan to take it over.

What a load of predictable, uninspiring dross this is. Gandolfini tries his best with this dull script, but Redford has phoned his performance in.

Drowning in a sea of clichés and implausibilities, "The Last Castle" is a colossal comical mess of Hollywood production work that is trite and predictable in every step of the way. It can actually get borderline disrespectful at times with its scenes of character incompetencies.

Un général 3 étoiles fait le mariole dans une prison militaire ou disons un ex-général 3 étoiles puisqu’il a écopé d’une peine de 10 piges pour on ne sait trop quelle raison mais apparemment des gens sont morts par sa faute… Et v’là-t’y pas que ce vieux con de Redford qui n’arrête pas de parader nous rejoue le Pont de la rivière Kwaï à lui tout seul, sans gêne, sans honte, sans aucun respect. Mais le résultat tourne plutôt vers ‘Haute sécurité’ avec Stallone que le Pont avec Guinness… et le tout est noyé dans une infâme propagande patriotico-pro-militaire. Dommage, car le film est assez bien réalisé et Gandolfini est le seul à tirer son épingle du jeu dans cette pantalonnade navrante même pas drôle au quinzième degré, ni faite, ni à faire.