LAST RESORT (1986)

 

Directed By: Zane Buzby Written By: Steve Zacharias and Jeff Buhai Cinematography: Steven Katz and Alex Nepomniaschy Editor: Gregory Scherick 

Cast: Charles Grodin, Robin Pearson Rose, John Ashton, Megan Mullally, Jon Lovitz, Phil Hartman, Mario Van Peebles, Gerrit Graham, Brenda Bakke, David Mirkin, Scott Nemes, Jacob Vargas

George Lollar takes his family on vacation with "Club Sand", a shoddy and untrustworthy company. On their tropical island, they find soldiers everywhere, an unhelpful staff, inhospitable accommodation, and undesirable holidaymakers, but everyone except George manages to have fun in the sun.

This is a Film that I have always seen the poster in box art for. I might have even remembered a commercial, or at least a preview of it.

So, after all these years, I finally decided to sit down and watch it, and I can see I was wise to avoid it for all those previous years. the only noteworthy thing about this movie is its casting.

He calls itself a comedy, but while he tries to be funny, they are seldom laughs to be had. It is basically a visual guide of what can go wrong and will go wrong, especially when you are a nuclear family.

And there are a lot of comedic recognizable actors in this film either before or while they were on SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE, as well as less recognizable actors. It’s a rare early role for Megan Mullally of will and grace for instance 

Though the film seems to beat a dead horse as it just shows a Family on a nightmare vacation in a Third World country in the 1980s where the staff is more interested in partying rather than helping

While Charles Grodin’s character, the father of the family stays unhappy and complains and has to deal with all the shenanigans around him, his family slowly one by one is charmed by the resort and it’s a residence so that soon he is the only stick in the mud 

So if you are a fan of watching Charles Grodin, be the street man and get exasperated as the conditions get more and more ridiculous. This is a Film for you. If you thought he yelled a lot in his other films, you ain’t seen anything yet.

They must’ve paid Charles Grodin very well and allowed him to pretty much be his screen. Self knows that seems to be what he does throughout the film and is probably the rare occurrence of him having a lead role. Though supposedly he believed this to be his funniest film. As he also helped rewrite it.

For a film that seems to hint at being a sex comedy and offers plenty of T&A. The film shows a little but prefers to suggest rather than show. If it did show this might have made it into National Lampoon territory. As it seems a bit inspired by the Chevy Chase Starring. National Lampoon’s Vacation movies 

if you want to watch some comedic actors before they were stars, embarrass themselves by doing bad accents this is the film for you 

It’s just shocking how few laughs there are in a film stacked with a great cast. This is truly an example of looks being deceiving.

Grade: F