The Last Tycoon (1976) User Reviews

Disjointed, uneven, and strangely memorable

[macsperkins · 7/10 · 29 January 2004]

Kazan and Pinter's THE LAST TYCOON is disjointed, uneven, and strangely memorable -- rather like an oddly unsettling, hazily recalled dream.

Robert De Niro, in a quietly amazing performance, disappears into the title character of Monroe Stahr, a workaholic Hollywood producer who is, in Keats's phrase, "half in love with easeful death." (This understated movie is from the same year as De Niro's flashy bravura turn in Martin Scorsese's TAXI DRIVER.)

Most of the supporting cast is excellent, including Robert Mitchum and Ray Milland as a couple of Shakespearean-knavish villains, Jack Nicholson, Donald Pleasence, Theresa Russell, and Dana Andrews.

Ingrid Boulting is beautiful but somewhat less satisfactory as Stahr's love interest, Kathleen Moore. In fairness, however, her role is deliberately written as something of an enigma: Kathleen Moore is a blank movie screen onto which Stahr, a near-solipsist, projects fantasies and memories of his deceased wife.

The various elements of THE LAST TYCOON never quite cohere into a whole, but several scenes have stuck in my memory ever since I first saw it years ago. Among them:

• Stahr's mock-lecture to the misfit screenwriter Boxley (Donald Pleasence), beginning: "You've been fighting duels all day..."

• Kathleen Moore telling Stahr, over the insistent crash of the surf at his unfinished ocean-front mansion, "I want ... a quiet life"

• Stahr's informal evening meeting with a labor-union organizer (Jack Nicholson), during which the privately despondent movie producer grows increasingly drunk and belligerent; and ...

• The closing ten minutes or so of the film, which take on an almost surreal quality: Disembodied lines of dialogue from earlier scenes recur; Stahr repeats his earlier speech to Boxley, only now as a soliloquy addressed directly to the camera; and then -- murmuring "I don't want to lose you" -- he seems to hallucinate a vision of Kathleen as she moves on to a new life without him.

Only Jeanne Moreau and Tony Curtis struck me as jarringly miscast in their parts. They -- and their comic-pathetic scenes as insecure movie idols -- seemed to belong to another movie entirely.

THE LAST TYCOON is an uneven work but most assuredly has its merits.

sorry, the Emperor has no clothes

[blanche-2 · 6/10 · 12 June 2014]

Robert De Niro is handsome, slim, and elegant as "The Last Tycoon," a 1976 film with a screenplay by Harold Pinter and directed by Elia Kazan. The original story is by F. Scott Fitzgerald.

Some background: After Norma Shearer retired, she wanted Tyrone Power to film "The Last Tycoon," which she planned to produce. Fitzgerald modeled the main character, Monroe Stahr, after Shearer's late husband, Irving Thalberg. The film never happened.

Like Hemingway, Fitzgerald is difficult to put on film, though for different reasons. Fitzgerald was a true poet, and his words did everything. There's not much action. Thus is the case in "The Last Tycoon," where nothing happens for what seems like hours.

The film sports a fabulous cast of old-timers: Robert Mitchum, Tony Curtis, Jeanne Moreau, Ray Milland, Dana Andrews, and John Carradine; and it introduces us to Theresa Russell, Angelica Huston, and Ingrid Boulting, who now teaches yoga in Ojai California and looks exactly the same as she does in this film. Don't ask me how. Jack Nicholson has a small role, as does everyone except De Niro and Boulting. The rest jump in and out like pop tarts.

This is a somewhat fictionalized version of Thalberg's life at MGM. He is involved in a romance with Kathleen Moore (Ingrid Boulting) who seems to be playing mind games with him. She says goodbye when she means hello, tells him that she can't see him again and then shows up, writes him farewell letters five minutes after she sees him, that kind of thing. Cecilia (Theresa Russell), the daughter of the studio head Pat Brady (Mitchum) is madly in love with him, but he doesn't even notice as he's so fixated on Kathleen, who is engaged to someone else but keeps coming around.

Brady, modeled on Louis B. Mayer, resents Stahr, as Mayer resented Thalberg, but Brady only says he resents him. We never see him REALLY resent him. No one really does much interacting. Tony Curtis sports a mustache as Rodriguez, a sexually confused leading man who is playing opposite the temperamental Didi (Jeanne Moreau) in a Casablance ripoff that has Moreau in Ingrid Bergman's same hat and coat, and Curtis playing the piano. P. S. Moreau can sing about as well as Ingrid Bergman hummed "As Time Goes By" -- not well. There is a moment of humor when, as the film ends with Moreau saying 'Nor do I,'there is a moment of silence. Then Brady says, "The French actresses are so...compelling." Silence. Stahr says, "'Nor do I. Nor do I.' When has anyone ever said to you, 'nor do I?' The scene has to be completely reshot, it's awful. I want four writers assigned to it tonight."

De Niro is perfection as Monroe Stahr, from the way he sits at his desk wearing his horn-rimmed glasses, to his posture. Boulting is exceedingly dull. I never thought Theresa Russell could act her way out of a phone booth, though she had a few decent moments in "Black Widow." Most of the actors are completely wasted. One interesting thing: Viewing this film today, one becomes aware of how un-used we are now seeing older actors sans face lifts, big lips, and botox.

All in all, I found this film disappointing. Pinter's script is slow and long, there's no excitement, let alone much story. Elia Kazan was a great director, but there probably wasn't much that he could do.

"The Last Tycoon" has been lauded by some as an unappreciated masterpiece, but one of the reviewers on IMDb also felt Theresa Russell gave a brilliant performance. I didn't see what some of these enlightened viewers saw, nor have I been haunted by the movie. In fact, I find it easy to forget.

Although there are flashes of goodness, The Last Tycoon falls short of being anything rich.

[johnnyboyz · 6/10 · 16 August 2008]

Films about the film industry tend to be self-mocking at the best of times. Singin' in the Rain poked fun at the coming of sound and outlined the difficulties it brought to the industry amongst a love story and a few other things. Additionaly,the more contemporary The Player brought to our attention the trials and tribulations of a Hollywood film producer as he struggles to balance everything at once, complete with disgruntled rejected writers. So it's sort of a shame as well as a surprise that The Last Tycoon does not hit as many spots as I thought it might with it ending up as a slow burning but ultimately unrewarding experience.

The film adopts an approach that makes it come across as more of a love story than anything else, but there is a sub-narrative involved that revolves around De Niro's character of Monroe Stahr gradually getting more and more confused with his life and things around him. The primary problem here is the film is not involving enough to warrant it an interesting or touching love story and the dedication to the focus of a man slowly getting more and more overwhelmed is undercooked – both are there and done reasonably well but both feel anti-climatic. Along with this and like I said in the opening paragraph, the film does not poke fun at and nor does it reference enough the industry in which it's set so it doesn't feel particularly clever, something Singin' in the Rain and The Player were because they did it very well and to good comic effect.

There is a definite study going on here with some substance in the sense it is about Stahr and his struggles with his current life and his love for newly acquired girlfriend Kathleen Moore (Boulting) but nothing much else. Is it a romance? Probably, but is it a good romance? Not really. Ingrid Boulting is shot in an extremely objective manner with lots of brightly lit shots and compositions that reveal enough of her body at particularly nicely timed incidences in the film. This is twinned with several close ups of De Niro's facial expressions in which the lust and desire is very much apparent. It would be easy to argue that these objective and obvious set ups revolving around a gaze of some sort are deliberate given the film is about film-making and that very early on there is a scene involving a man and woman shooting a romantic scene of some sort. But the concentration on a genuine romance between two characters in the story we're watching is clearly trying to come across as serious and thus; being self-aware of its own compositions is an idea the film fails to get across.

But before this romantic distraction gets involved, the film begins in a light-hearted but intriguing style. An individual answers a question on how difficult it must be to shoot an earthquake scene and they laugh, replying that shaking the camera usually works and insulting the idea as a cheap effect. Sure enough about ten minutes later, there is an earthquake within the universe of The Last Tycoon and we realise the film is poking fun at itself. Then there is the other concentrated dig early on that, unfortunately, isn't played on an awful lot and that involves Tony Curtis' character Rodriguez and Tony Curtis as a whole. The character name of Rodriguez is short and sharp – it is exotic in the sense it sounds 'Latino' and we all know that 'Latinos' in Hollywood cinema are usually scorching hot in their appearance (at least the women are). Rodriguez is an actor who appears in lots of films about love and making love; he appears topless in the scenes within the scenes that Tony Curtis is filming. The point here being that Curtis himself is (or was) a bit of a pin-up and his public figure is being spoofed through him playing the part of a romantic lead in a film within a film.

When all is said and done, The Last Tycoon is a study of one man and his issues. It is not as engrossing as De Niro's own Taxi Driver from the same year and nor is it as interesting or disturbing as more contemporary examples like American Psycho and One Hour Photo. The film substitutes daily rigmarole and movie set interaction for the introduction of Boulting as the dull love interest and shoots her body accordingly. Twinned with this is a visit from Brimmer, played by Jack Nicholson, which is ill timed and feels out of place given the route the film had gone down at that point. While the film isn't particularly bad, it feels underdone and somewhat one dimensional. Its study of love and stress is alright but it does not demonise the film industry in ways it could've and nor does it feel particularly urgent. This could revolve around anyone, in any industry, at any time and that said, The Last Tycoon is pretty ordinary.

frustrating but valuable

[didi-5 · 14 January 2002]

After reading the book (and Fitzgerald's notes about how he saw the story progressing) I expected high quality from Kazan's film treatment. Much has been made of his decision to have an almost comatose Monroe Stahr, unable to express emotion on anything but movies, and in this I think he partly succeeded. But the film as a whole irritates me. It's one I've gone back to several times and I can't work out why it has that effect. It just does. In relation to the book, some scenes are pretty much verbatim, some are added to, some are ditched altogether, there just seems no reasoning behind it. The plusses - it has an interesting ending and an equally interesting supporting cast of old timers, most of whom are always worth watching. It has a certain amount of style and character of its own. It's just not that easy to enjoy, IMO.

What an amazing cast!! Too bad the film lacked energy.

[planktonrules · 7/10 · 3 October 2020]

Whether or not "The Last Tycoon" is a great movie or not, it's a must-see for folks like me who love classic Hollywood. Think about it...the film features the talents of folks like Robert Mitchum, Robert De Niro, Ray Milland, Jeanne Moreau, John Carradine, Tony Curtis, Dana Andrews and Jack Nicholson ALL in the same film! And, this doesn't include all the famous supporting actors such as Jeff Corey, Seymour Cassel, Theresa Russell, Peter Strauss and more!! Wow...what an amazing cast director Elia Kazan had on hand for this picture.

The story was inspired by an unfinished story by F. Scott Fitzgerald. It's a story that seems to have been inspired by various real Hollywood folks...though it's very highly fictionalized. The main character, Monroe Stahr (De Niro), is the most closely like a real Hollywood icon, Irving Thalberg....and he is the 'tycoon' from the title. And, throughout the film, Stahr burns the candle at both ends....working non-stop like Thalberg and a man who seemingly has the Midas touch. But, in many, many other ways he and Thalberg are very much different...so much so that it's obviously not meant as a biography of the man. It's more like a jumping off point....with a character reminiscent of Thalberg at the beginning but much unlike him as the story progresses.

So is it any good? Yes...but also disappointing. With such a great cast and director, I really expected more. At times, the film felt episodic and the ending certainly felt incomplete. But I would also add that some of the performances were amazingly muted...to the point where I think the film could have used an infusion of energy and life. Too many times, De Niro and, later, his love interest, simply seemed half asleep and this did detract from the story. Overall, very much a mixed bag...worth seeing but quite uneven.

Wanna see Robert De Niro in a lousy movie?

[vincentlynch-moonoi · 6/10 · 27 December 2014]

Then here's your chance! I continued watching this movie to see if it continued to be as bad as the early scenes were. It was. Awkward dialog was rampant throughout the film. De Niro -- an actor I highly respect -- was wooden. The plot...once you figured out that it had one...meandered along. Elia Kazan was a great director, with the emphasis being on "was". He was beginning to lose his touch, and although he had some nice cinematic shots, the story stumbled along.

If you're wondering if I didn't find anything good about the movie...well, it's a very lavish production. visually, the film looks great.

Among the other actors, Tony Curtis was fine as a star with tremendous insecurities. Robert Mitchum and Ray Milland were fine as studio executives, though some of their dialog was questionable. Jeanne Moreau...a great actress...in other films. Jack Nicholson was interesting in a smaller role. Donald Pleasence was good as a misplaced screen writer. It was good to see Dana Andrews (as a floundering director), Peter Strauss, and John Carradine (as an old tour guide).

This film had potential, but Elia Kazan flubbed it. It's never good when you watch a film to see just how bad it is.

A Robert De Niro masterpiece, in an ambitious, very good but flawed film

[PaulusLoZebra · 7/10 · 19 November 2022]

Elia Kazan's The Last Tycoon is a very good film and well worth seeing. The absolute top reason to see it is for Robert DeNiro's outstanding performance, a reminder why he's the greatest American actor of his generation. The movie has many other fine performances, from a long list of big stars, that also make it a treat. Chief among those fine supporting performances was Theresa Russell's film debut. She was a nuanced and convincing. The film is also beautiful, with great period sets, excellent cinematography, and many close-ups of distinctive faces that told their stories without words. The film's structure, pacing, imagery (the unfinished beach house) and editing were also pleasing, and conveyed respect for the film and for the audience.

All that said, The Last Tycoon feels somehow unsatisfying, and surely did not reach the heights of greatness to be expected from a collaboration of Fitzgerald, Spiegel, Kazan and Pinter, on a big budget and with a dozen major stars. My own speculation is that the movie makers were too familiar with the details of Fitzgerald's story, and as they cut scenes and made changes they forgot to look at their work from the perspective of a moviegoer who has not read the novel and does not know the story.

A disjointed movie with no direction and no story.

[zenobia-2 · 3/10 · 7 April 1999]

An irritating tale, with little structure. DeNiro's character is so lackluster that empathy is impossible. Indeed, direction was so poor that DeNiro comes off as a shallow man without any direction or purpose other than being miserable. Some big actors in small parts including a nicely underplayed Jack Nicholson. The best part was the bit part played by the trained seal, at least the motivation for his character was clear!

One of the Most Overlooked Films in History For Good and For Bad...

[Don-102 · 9/10 · 24 June 1999]

What a mystery THE LAST TYCOON has been. This is a large-scale film with perhaps the greatest cast of male actors in history and nary a mention is made of it. Most critics bash it, the common viewer may dismiss it, but you cannot deny its place in history. It is not often you will find such a pool of talent AND a movie with both Robert De Niro and Jack Nicholson on screen together. They even FIGHT! By the way, THE LAST TYCOON also happens to be an excellent, if flawed, work of art.

Director Elia Kazan (GENTLEMEN'S AGREEMENT, ON THE WATERFRONT) and company have taken F. Scott Fitzgerald's unfinished novel about the politics and personal conflicts of 1930's Hollywood and put forth an off-beat, unusual picture. Kazan is one of only three directors to successfully direct motion pictures between the 1940's on through the 1970's (the other 2 being Hitchcock and Huston). A staggeringly legendary cast play their parts effectively instead of just calling in their performances, which easily could have happened. Perhaps there was some competition between the old school actors and their methods (Mitchum, Milland, Andrews, Curtis, Pleasence to name a few) and the "method" actors like De Niro or Nicholson who symbolically take the torch in this film. This is especially true of De Niro's extraordinary lead as "Monroe Stahr" (based on Irving Thalberg). Kazan helped to create the "method" acting concept, so who better to direct such a crossroad of talent.

"Monroe Stahr" is a no nonsense "Studio Chief" who I'm sure Fitzgerald encountered while a hack writer in Hollywood during his final years. De Niro as "Stahr" orders cuts here and fires directors there and caters to what he thinks audiences want. He is actually a noble character, something Fitzgerald may not have meant to express. He must deal with Robert Mitchum and Ray Milland, who represent the corporate, artless side of the picture business and later the writer's wing (represented by Mr. Nicholson). As expected, there are many conflicts of interest but the movie's magic lies in the amazing contrast Kazan and company make between the dream world of an old black and white movie and what happened when the director yelled "CUT".

I love classic black and white films and one of the aspects that made them so great was the world you were thrust into. Fake backdrops, miniatures, and grand sets surrounded the actors in most of them, but the dream-like quality of a black and white film kept you involved. With this film, some curiously familiar "fictional" film clips are used for screening purposes where the studio executives would clap or claw at what was projected (They were filmed specifically for this film). Kazan and co. create scenes from supposed films (one was CASABLANCA turned inside out) to add some realism to it all. We get to see an actor from the movies-within-the-movie "on" and "off-screen". Tony Curtis has some good early scenes as a perfect screen presence, but an awfully inept star "off-screen" when he meets with De Niro to confess his sexual confusion in real life. You'll know what I mean if you see the flick for yourself.

LAST TYCOON is a love story more than anything. Many people may dismiss the love angle as a distraction. I found it slightly hypnotic and mysterious. The love interest, played by a beautiful actress named Ingrid Boulting, is great at exuding an elusive quality, something the De Niro character can't put his finger on. It all leads up to a somewhat vague climax and ending, but perhaps the filmmakers were unable to come up with the final stamp Fitzgerald failed to accomplish himself.

This is a film for discerning and patient film-goers only. It is unlike anything I have ever seen before. That is why I see movies. Why the film has been so looked over is bizarre. Even if you consider it a complete flop, it deserves recognition, if only for the great cast. If you like classic films and know a thing or two about film history, you may know why THE LAST TYCOON is so captivating.

RATING: 8 1/2 of 10

Loving Not Wisely But Too Well.

[rmax304823 · 7/10 · 4 September 2013]

I stopped reading Fitzgerald's novel about half way through because it was embarrassingly bad, coming as it did after his masterpiece, "The Great Gatsby," and left unedited. The film isn't much of an advance as far as plot is concerned. It's more of a character sketch than a gripping story. A man only loves two things and loses them both.

But what a cast and crew! Elia Kazan directs De Niro, Mitchum, Curtis, Moreau, Nicholson, Theresa Russell, Donald Pleasance, Ray Milland, Jeff Corey, Dana Andrews, Angelica Huston, and other familiar presences in a screenplay by Harold Pinter from a novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald. What a pedigree.

De Niro has never been better, not even as an Italian-American hood. He's thrown himself into the role, altering his appearance so that he's hardly recognizable -- pale, very thin, perceptive, sensitive, taciturn, blunt.

As the Thalberg figure at MGM, he loves making movies. He's as demanding with himself as he is with everyone else. He has no genuine social life until he falls in love at first sight with Ingrid Boulting. That's the second thing he loves. And after she has a brief fling with him, she ditches him to marry another man. Boulting, alas, isn't much of an actress. She has a fine figure but the overall impression she generates in the viewer is that of some kind of animated, life-sized kewpie doll. The other recognizable names in the cast don't really have much to do, while Boulting has too much screen time.

The final scene, after De Niro is fired, is pretty stylized. He repeats an earlier scene, this time speaking directly to the camera, and the last we see of him is when his figure disappears into the vast, black maw of an empty sound stage. The real Thalberg died of a heart ailment while still in his thirties. Sad.

Too Tough A Task To Tackle

[samkan · 4/10 · 4 February 2009]

F. Scott Fitzgerald's writing is beautiful, very lyrical but his character's words are not to be taken at face value. His description is vivid though he does not use fancy - or too many - words. He has a clear point of view or opinion about the people he writes about. But if his writing appears matter-of-fact, fly-on-the-wall, etc. it is anything but that. In THE LAST TYCOON he wants to tell us about his problems with alcohol and women, the effect of communists unionizing Hollywood writers, and - like always - the unique agonies of the very wealthy class. Like his other fiction, dialog is a minor inconvenience serving to support the overall description of what's happening - better conveyed by mood, atmosphere and pretense. Not in spite of but as a result of FSF's talent, his writing can simply put blunt description in his characters mouth and allow it to melt with his narration. His ability to convey mood is that compelling.

Translating such to film creates a problem. The scenes in TLT are comically bad. Irony is given new definition when Stahr rejects a scene on the basis that 'People don't talk that way". People don't talk like the characters in TLT. Allow me to suggest that a successful adaptation of an FSF story would contain limited dialog, even to the extent such requires omitting what dialog the novel or short story contains. Sometimes a literal interpretation is not necessarily faithful.

A tour-de-force performance by De Niro

[Moon_shot · 10/10 · 18 January 2003]

Robert De Niro arguably gave the most critically acclaimed performances during the 1970's in movies like "Mean Streets", "Bang the Drum Slowly", "The Godfather, Part II", "Taxi Driver, "The Deer Hunter", etc.,. Little has been said, however, about his turn as Monroe Stahr in "The Last Tycoon" - quite possibly De Niro's most underrated and most uncharacteristic performance on screen. "The Last Tycoon", itself, was a mixed bag among the critics. Some liked it. Some didn't. In my view, "The Last Tycoon" was a movie that deserves a place in film history for exploring Hollywood in the inside. This movie, however, provides only a small glimpse into this which was why the critics were divided. Shortly put, "The Last Tycoon" deals with a top producer's (De Niro) everyday life and the conflict that arises when he sees a lost loved one - albeit in a different way.

The movie boasts of several big names of the past as well as the present. Robert Mitchum, Jeanne Moreau, Anjelica Huston (in a cameo), Tony Curtis, John Carradine, etc., were few of the key players. Jack Nicholson makes a late appearance in the film providing for some brilliant, electric scenes with De Niro. In fact their scenes together (undoubtedly the highlight of the movie) make the one scene that De Niro and Al Pacino shared in Michael Mann's "Heat" seem pedestrian. De Niro and Nicholson, two of the greatest actors American film has even seen, will most likely never work together again considering their stature today which makes their scenes together in "The Last Tycoon" that much more priceless. Ingrid Boutling, a British model, is cast opposite De Niro and gives a wooden performance. She is the only weak link of the picture. A young Theresa Russell also gives an able supporting performance. Ultimately, however, "The Last Tycoon" lies solely on De Niro's shoulders and he makes full use of the opportunity and then some. De Niro's interpretation of a movie mogul (reportedly based on Irving G. Thalberg) is absolutely genuine and original. Looking trim and handsome, De Niro gives a towering, commanding performance as Monroe Stahr and it is his work here that holds the picture together. Though the critics were split down the middle in their opinion regarding this film, there was one thing they agreed upon. Robert De Niro gives an authentic, striking performance in the central role. In my opinion, a performance which deserved an Oscar nomination.

Too....Many.... Pauses...

[nelsonhodgie · 6/10 · 2 July 2020]

Between Pinter's sparse dialogue and Kazan's method direction there are scenes that go on far too long because the actors are constantly pausing for dramatic effect. De Niro is excellent as the Thalberg like mogul .Nicholson also very good playing the union big shot in perhaps the smallest role of his career post Easy Rider. At points when DeNiro is at the studio or in the screening room The Last Tycoon is a very compelling look at Hollywood of the 30s. However the romance with DeNiro and the enigmatic very enigmatic too too enigmatic Ingrid Boulting brings the film to an absolute standstill. It never recovers and the ending is anticlimactic. I agree with the reviewer who thinks Teresa Russell is awful. So is the unattractive Jeanne Moreau. I've never understood her appeal. Tony Curtis and Robert Mitchum give their usual competent performances. Worth one viewing but that's about it.

Spiritless

[moonspinner55 · 5/10 · 1 June 2007]

Elia Kazan methodically directs Harold Pinter's limp adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's last (and unfinished) novel about a workaholic movie mogul (named Monroe Stahr, who bears a literary resemblance to Irving Thalberg) under pressure in 1930s Hollywood. As played by the gaunt, seemingly still-green Robert De Niro, this tycoon never comes to life, and since he is at the center of the piece, it simply plods along to a soulless conclusion. Great supporting players (including Jack Nicholson, Tony Curtis, Robert Mitchum, Jeanne Moreau, Dana Andrews and Anjelica Huston) end up just standing around, while the film's period-flavor disappoints and the golden-toned cinematography never envelopes us (nothing in the film is visually lyrical, which may be why Kazan resorted to some 'classy' nude shots to spike the action). One may sense the production is a heady one, with a great deal of prestige behind it, but it never builds a head of steam and is mainly aloof and alienating. ** from ****

Fitzgerald's romance turned arctic

[matt-201 · 19 March 1999]

Fitzgerald's unfinished novel about the romantic yearnings of an Irving Thalberg-like mogul (Robert DeNiro) is turned into the screenwriter Harold Pinter's stock in trade: a sphinxlike ballet of omitted information. The mixture of Pinter's ellipsis-strewn dialogue rhythms and the coarseness of the Old Hollywood setting gives the picture a strange, detached mood--cryptic, teasing, vaguely dislikable. DeNiro would nail this sewed-up-kingpin character two decades later in Scorsese's CASINO; here, whether through youthful inexperience or Pinter's deletions, he's remote and untantalizing. The punch of Fitzgerald's story--the hyperefficient chief's destruction through a search for the love he never found--never lands, because Pinter has drawn the character as a pinched, uncommunicative stick who seems to have no inner life. (It doesn't help that the director, Elia Kazan, seems unsure if he wants to communicate that DeNiro's love interest, Ingrid Boulting, is either a vapid lump or a pornographic doll.) Pinter designs most of the scenes to have anti-payoffs; in one--DeNiro's counsel to a panicky, impotent movie star (Tony Curtis)--he seems to have carefully tailored a joke with no punchline. With Theresa Russell, who gives the best performance as the Big Boss' daughter, and Jack Nicholson, in one of his finest tiny-role performances as a strangely fastidious union organizer. Also with Robert Mitchum, Ray Milland, Donald Pleasence, Seymour Cassel, Jeff Corey, and an extremely young, haunted-looking Anjelica Huston.

So Many Greats, Just The Movie Missing

[johnnyhbtvs27 · 6/10 · 8 February 2022]

A slow, rather plodding affair, The Last Tycoon seems like a great opportunity wasted. Ray Milland, Dana Andrews & Robert Mitchum are giving little to do while Tony Curtis & Donald Pleasence provide great efforts with what they are given. Theresa Russell is a standout in her debut role, she carries herself real well against the acting giants she is working with. The big pleasure of the movie is seeing Robert De Niro & Jack Nicholson act opposite each other for the first and only time. It's the screen time they share that elevates the movie from the dull affair it is up to that point.

Great DeNiro but Lacks Force!

[shepardjessica-1 · 6/10 · 13 December 2004]

I love Elia Kazan, although by the 70's he'd pretty much had it. In the same year as TAXI DRIVER, Mr. DeNiro gave another career-launching performance in this F. Scott Fitzgerald story which doesn't play out on the screen that well. All of this work is tough to adapt to the cinema. Theresa Russell (in her first role) is young and delightful. Tony Curtis is marvelous as a paranoid movie star and Jeanne Moreau is starting to slide. Robert Mitchum, Dana Andrews, and Donald Pleasance play established Hollywood types.

An valiant attempt at Fitzgerald, but comes up short (with no blame put on DeNiro). At least films like this were attempted in the 70's, unlike the dreaded '80's where junk prevailed for years. Seeing this may prod you into reading the novel (his last/unfinished work). A 6 out of 10.

The First Mistake ...

[writers_reign · 6/10 · 17 February 2011]

... was in attempting to film this great unfinished novel in the first place, the second was employing an English writer and the third was casting Robert de Niro in the lead. DeNiro's definition of 'Acting' is to shout at the top of his voice and behave like a sociopath. Unfortunately lots of people - some of them influential - who should know better have applauded this and encouraged him to continue. Monroe Stahr is diametrically opposite DeNiro, a thoughtful, quiet intellectual light years away from DeNiro's wise guy whose solution to problems on the studio floor would be to kick the director to death and throw acid into the faces of the actors. Even Gadg can't do anything with this so he elected to shoot it as though everyone were under water wading through molasses. Virtually no one relates to anyone else least of all Stahr and Kathleen. Scott must be turning in his grave.

Unfinished Inspiration

[bkoganbing · 5/10 · 31 December 2008]

At one time a film that had Robert Mitchum, Ray Milland, Tony Curtis, and Dana Andrews all in the same cast would have blown some studio's budget. But all of these guys who were leading men in the past are in support of a young Robert DeNiro in F. Scott Fitzgerald's unfinished, The Last Tycoon.

This film was one of the few failures of Robert DeNiro's career. I don't think he was able to get inside his character mainly because I don't think F. Scott Fitzgerald ever really fleshed him out in the first place. In fact as legend has it, Monroe Stahr is based on Fitzgerald's friend, movie executive Irving Thalberg. But I think there's just as much on that other boy genius over at MGM, David O. Selznick. There's no way Irving Thalberg would have ever gotten drunk and try to duke it out with the bargaining agent for the newly formed Writer's Guild. But Selznick was perfectly capable of that. Selznick was also the guy who did marry the boss's daughter, Louis B. Mayer's daughter Irene was his first wife whom he left for Jennifer Jones.

This was Elia Kazan's last film and sad that he went out on a career note of middle C. Theresa Russell made a nice debut as the Irene Selznick character here. The real Irene was not quite the naive school girl that we meet in The Last Tycoon. I liked also what Tony Curtis and Jeanne Moreau did as a pair of neurotic married stars.

Best in the film however is Jack Nicholson who is the agent from New York organizing the Writer's Guild. Remember Elia Kazan's background as a friendly witness at the House Un-American Activities Committee. Believe it or not, there really were Communist party members trying to organize in the labor movement back in the day. This was Kazan's last attempt at explaining his actions. Anyway Nicholson who only comes in for the last 10 minutes of the film, makes his brief scenes with DeNiro really count.

The Last Tycoon did get an Academy Award nomination for Best Costume Design and the film certainly did look like the Thirties in Hollywood. Maybe if Fitzgerald had ever finished his story, The Last Tycoon might have been better.

Misunderstood masterpiece

[pdoniger · 9/10 · 11 August 2001]

De Niro was an unexpected surprise as Monroe Starr in this brilliant adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's unfinished last novel. He gives a thoughtful, sensitive, and intelligent performance as this character, who was modeled on MGM producer, Irving Thalberg. Fitzgerald wrote about Hollywood from the inside, and from the perspective of someone who was destroying himself by being inside. He could ask for nothing better than to have English playwright Harold Pinter create this stark, human screenplay and then have Elia Kazan realize it.

In addition to De Niro's definitive performance, we get a series of perfect cameos (usually an impossibility) from Tony Curtis, Jeanne Moreau, Robert Mitchum, and others. We also get two screen debuts of merit -- Angelica Huston (in a small, but memorable scene) and an excellent Teresa Russell as Starr's would-be sweetheart. The critics hated the movie, and it did poorly in box offices, but it was truly, like Fitzgerald himself, an American masterpiece.

A monumental waste

[clydefrogg · 6/10 · 23 January 2002]

Wow. I don't know if I've ever been as disappointed with a film as I was with this one. Maybe it was a bad idea for Hollywood to try and finish something Fitzgerald did not, but I'll leave that to the literary buffs.

Fitzgerald aside, what is presented in The Last Tycoon is what I consider to be a brilliant portrayal of Irving Thalberg by Robert De Niro. I've always thought, based on what I've read about Thalberg and the Studio System of the 30s/40s, that he was a remarkable and fascinating individual. I had a picture painted in my mind as to how I thought Thalberg "looked", acted, and generally carried himself as he patrolled the MGM lots. In my opinion, De Niro nailed it. He played him EXACTLY as I had pictured him. From this perspective, I was enthralled by the film for about a half hour.

Then, I guess the Fitzgerald element had to come in. Stahr, De Niro's character, becomes obsessed with a girl he sees on the lot that sort of kind of reminds him of someone he may or may not have had some sort of relationship with, it's not really clear. It doesn't matter anyway, because the story REEKS. As a self proclaimed film buff, I hate to express myself so simple mindedly, but there it is.

I'm not going to dwell on the stench of the love story of this film. It's bad, and badly done. It's one of those films (The original Getaway is another) where I sit there watching particular scenes and wonder what the hell was going through the screenwriter's mind when he wrote it. Particularly the entire character of Cecilia, played by Jeanne Moreau.

I just can't help but lament over what could have been. Irving Thalberg was a fascinating individual and there are countless stories that could be written about him for the silver screen. Why did they have to take this route? They had the dollars in production to recreate the Hollywood of the 30s, a couple of screen legends (Curtis and Mitchum) and most importantly, Thalberg reincarnated in De Niro. And they flat out blew it.

It's just too bad Thalberg wasn't around to screen this before it was released.

All that talent....

[jfsch · 5/10 · 10 June 2021]

To quote Robert De Niro's character in the last 10 minutes of the film,"This is a waste of time."

A Potpourri of Vestiges Review: Elia Kazan's highly underrated masterwork of cinematic art

[murtaza_mma · 9/10 · 15 October 2013]

The Last Tycoon, Elia Kazan's swan song based on F. Scott Fitzgerald's final, unfinished novel of the same name, is an important work of cinematic art. The Last Tycoon can be approached in different ways depending purely on the viewer's taste and his level of understanding.

First, at its most basic level, it is a film about films and people who make them: writers, directors, actors, producers and studio bosses, not in the increasing order of their creative importance but in terms of their actual influence as prevalent during the Golden Age of Hollywood.

Second way to approach it is to look upon it as a tale of unrequited love. Third, as a film about the fall of a man from omnipotence to oblivion. Fourth, The Last Tycoon is about the inflated human ego and the Lear-like grand operatic collapse it so often triggers.

Fifth and the most complex way to approach it would be as a surrealistic expression of an artist working at the height of his powers and desperate to make the most of the final few opportunities left with him.

The Last Tycoon features quite a few memorable performances including cameos from Tony Curtis, Jeanne Moreau and Jack Nicholson. The film revolves around a Hollywood movie producer, named Monroe Stahr, slowly working himself to death.

Robert De Niro is absolutely breathtaking to watch as Stahr—a role fashioned upon Irving Thalberg, the production chief at MGM during the late '20s and '30s. The scenes that he shares with Jack Nicholson—the only ones that the two legendary actors ever shared on the celluloid—are pure gold.

De Niro shares great chemistry with the two female leads who complement him really well. While Ingrid Boulting is delectable to watch in her enigmatic portrayal of Kathleen Moore, Theresa Russell creates a strong impact in the limited screen time she gets.

The Last Tycoon, as underrated as it is, deserves much more attention than what it has received over the last four decades. The movie succeeds in breaking the glittery image of the Tinsel Town, which is often portrayed as some kind of a Shangri-La for the young and upcoming artists, by presenting a caricature that's far more realistic.

The movie may lack the refinement of a work of commercial art but its unfinished crudeness definitely makes it more lifelike. It's a movie that hasn't lost its relevance with time and perhaps that's what makes it a timeless gem of cinema. The restless viewers can afford to stay put, but those with patience must check it out, for they would be thoroughly rewarded.

For more, please visit my film blogsite:

http://www.apotpourriofvestiges.com/

Lost in the middle....going nowhere!!

[elo-equipamentos · 7/10 · 20 December 2017]

A kind of re-telling story from the thirties where great film studio were managed by some genius pick up among them, the master Elia Kazan was a remarkable director and made a fine work here, the first half hour is very interesting around studio's matters, but when the Tycoon meets a young girl who suppose to be your late woman alike, since then the whole thing collapse and lose the magic, a fine performance from De Niro disappears in the dust of lack imagination, in fact they missed a good oportunity to make a great movie, for Kazan and De Niro and just for them 7/10.

Resume:

First watch: 1985 / How many: 3 / Source: TV/DVD / Rating: 7

What a snooze fest

[oehmigen · 4/10 · 31 January 2022]

This movie is interesting only for film nerds, I think. On paper, it looks great: you have one of the most influential directors of his time with Elia Kazan. It stars a young Robert De Niro who had a string of successful and critical acclaimed movies (Mean Streets, Godfather II, Taxi Driver, all made between 1973 and 1976) But not just De Niro was a big name; Robert Mitchum, Dana Andrews, Donald Pleasence, Tony Curtis, Anjelica Huston. And of course, Jack Nicholson won the Oscar a year before; in 1976 with "One flew over the cuckoo's nest" What could go wrong?

Almost everything, as it turns out.

The "story" sounds intriguing about a young movie producer Monroe Stahr (De Niro), working successfully in Hollywood in the 1930s. You do get a glimpse of how much power the studio bosses had in that time, just before significant changes happened with unions and writer guilds.

The film could go in so many directions: showing the shadow side of Tinseltown, maybe even a satire. Instead, what we've got is a dry, empty, uninteresting film that feels like an eternity.

Especially the romantic scenes involving Monroe Stahr and Katleen Moore are among the dullest performances I have seen for a long time. Especially actress Ingrid Boulting who plays Kathleen Moore had me almost in a coma. Boulting, a model turned actress, has nothing to add except a pretty face. It's not entirely her fault; it's also a very weak screenplay with dialogue that made me cringe. No idea what Kazan was thinking.

Only one highlight this film has to offer: Jack Nicholson's character Brimmer was quite good, but he came too late into the film. Still, nice to see De Niro and Nicholson in a few scenes together.

Finally, what I can say is that this movie is a trap. It looks good with all the talent who is involved in this film, but there is nothing inside, only for hardcore fans of Kazan or a particular actor.

It should be shown in film school as an example that great actors never automatically make a great film.