The Last Boy Scout (1991): C+

No wonder screenwriter Shane Black’s career took a nosedive shortly after The Last Boy Scout – there was nowhere left to go but down after creating the apotheosis of the modern interracial-buddy action film genre he helped popularize with 1987’s Lethal Weapon. Jammed full of so many ludicrously cartoonish set pieces and hip one-liners that it offers up a handy compendium of the era’s favorite blockbuster tropes, this Bruce Willis-Damon Wayans adventure begins with a corny parody of Monday Night Football’s intro musical theme and then a classic running back-with-a-gun sequence (featuring future Tae-Bo guru Billy Blanks, no less!), and takes off from there into all sorts of juvenile-macho nonsense. Down-on-his-luck detective Joe Hallenbeck (Willis, rehashing his sarcastic Die Hard routine) teams up with disgraced quarterback Jimmy Dix (Wayans) to solve the murder of Dix’s stripper girlfriend (a young Halle Berry), only to find himself trying to foil an elaborate sports-gambling conspiracy orchestrated by a crooked politician and a Texas businessman who owns a pro team. Directed by Tony Scott with the overblown TV commercial-ish aesthetic that was his then-trademark (before he progressed to his current over-edited, one-second-per-shot style), The Last Boy Scout is empty and laughable in every respect. And yet despite its general lousiness, it delivers the goofy goods like few of its genre brethren, while also functioning as a time capsule for that particular cinematic moment when the cheesy action film formula – comprised of excessive explosions, endless visual flash, no logic, and incessant tough-guy quips (sample: “I’m gonna shove an umbrella up your ass and open it”) – was about to become the hackneyed (and ripe-for-parody) cliché it is today.

Comments

[Matt Adcock]

Last Boyscout... wow, what a film!?
Nice write up which makes me want to watch it again - I'm a huge Bruce Willis fan and was at a tender enough age when this was released to be completely blown away on its tidal wave of macho gunplay bollocks...

BTW Really like your reviews and wondered if you wanted to swap links - I'm a UK reviewer over at DARKMATTERS: www.darkmatt.blogspot.com