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A bunch of high school grads go through the highs and lows of their last summer before starting college.
Starring KJ Apa, Maia Mitchell, Jacob Latimore, Halston Sage, Sosie Bacon
Written by Scott Bindley, William Bindley
Produced by Mike Karz, William Bindley, Wayne Rice
Duration 110 minutes
Wow. This must be what they mean about Netflix relentlessly churning out bland ‘content’.
In a first for me, or at least not for a long time, I had literally never heard of anyone in the cast or crew. It didn’t have to be a bad sign. But it was.
Now, according to Netflix, this film is "charming", "heart-felt", and "feel-good". But do I trust the streamer's three little algorithm-spewed adjectives? Do I bollocks.
I can remember when I lost faith in movie advertising (and, let’s face it, advertising in general). It was when I compared the ads for late-’90s British effort EAST IS EAST to the actual experience of watching the film. It was a decent enough post-FULL MONTY period culture-clash drama, with the odd bit of humour thrown in to alleviate the otherwise gritty goings on. But it certainly wasn't "side-splittingly funny" or "a rip-roaring comedy", as the poster had led me to believe.
(And as an aside, have you ever noticed the way every musical advertised on the side of a bus screams at you about how ‘feel-good’ it is? Let me tell you, they don’t make me feel good. So, there’s a flaw right there.)
Nowadays, with multiple streaming platforms, we get the privilege of being lied to from the comfort of our own homes!
I did go into THE LAST SUMMER with an open mind. I like the idea of the ‘summer it all changed’ movie. Finishing school and moving on to higher education or, if not, the world of work, is an inarguably big step. The best ‘significant summer’ movies are STAND BY ME and DAZED AND CONFUSED, but I didn’t elevate my expectations to an unreasonable level.
They were, nevertheless, not met.
The film goes for an ensemble approach, kind of like a shit Robert Altman. The ostensible lead (he gets some opening voiceover) is preppy KJ Apa, who has a crush on Maia Mitchell, a girl who is spending her summer making a documentary with WHEN HARRY MET SALLY-style couple interviews. I feel that the documentarian teenager has been done an awful lot, like maybe it’s even a trope now? There was definitely HAVOC, which had the advantage of Anne Hathaway breaking bad post-PRINCESS DIARIES, plus added Bijou Phillips.
Elsewhere in the overstuffed cast, there’s a couple wresting with whether to stay together long distance. There’s the professed stud who turns out to be a virgin. There are people getting summer jobs, like interning in the city with soulless office drones, tarmaccing driveways or babysitting the prototypical precocious child who speaks like a member of Mensa.
And there is also a pair of multicultural SUPERBAD-style nerds – but without the wit, personality or cutting delivery – who play VR games in the basement, worry about getting ‘carded’ and overanalyse every little thing. They even get a ‘walking toward the camera in slo-mo wearing suits’ shot – because that’s a fresh reference, RESERVOIR DOGS was only 30 years ago, after all.
One’s mind wanders during these under-nourishing movies. Is there a specific shop that sells those ubiquitous red plastic cups they always use at parties, or are they just generic? Is it really easier to wheel in a bunch of kegs than to simply buy your lager in bottles or cans? Does all this stem from a product-placement issue? And what’s with all the texting with the copy coming up on screen? Was this stylistic decision inspired by a Vodafone advert, or maybe an episode of Hollyoaks?
THE LAST SUMMER is a first draft script of brainstormed story strands still searching for actual characters, emotions and a cohesive whole. For a low-stakes movie to work, the personalities have to be strong. But we never feel invested in any of these kids’ plights or their connections with each other – everyone is too dull and samey to register.
It’s apparently set
in Chicago, and a Cubs baseball game is attended at one point, but there’s no
feel for place. In fact, every scene is so over-lit, in classic TV-movie style,
it looks like it takes place on the surface of the sun.
If there’s any kind of thematic depth at all, it’s something vague about following your creative dreams instead of settling for the stability of studying ‘business’ (yawn), or that maybe the prestigious university you were always told you should go to isn’t right for you after all (yawn again). Know who you are, be true to yourself, yadda-yadda-yadda.
So, a dud, then, but at least it’ll give these young actors a few more clips to add to their showreels. I’m pleased they didn’t waste their time along with mine.
One star out of five.
Valid use of the
word ‘last’? As far as I remember, my summers back home
between years at uni didn’t feel all that much different to the last one before I went. So I think the
finality here has been somewhat overstated.
What would a movie called THE FIRST
SUMMER be about? There's be far fewer games of beer pong, that’s for sure.
Previously: INDIANA JONES AND THE LAST CRUSADE
Next time: THE LAST LULLABY
Check out my books: Jonathanlastauthor.com
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