ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, May 25, 1996 TAG: 9605280117
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: B-10 EDITION: METRO
TYPE: MOVIE REVIEW
SOURCE: KATHERINE REED STAFF WRITER
Liberals may get the biggest charge out of "The Last Supper," but conservatives get the last, dying word in this movie about a group of graduate students who turn their Sunday night dinner parties into a conservative cleansing campaign.
We're talking murder, here, over good Cabernet, radicchio and homemade apple pie. But the question that lingers when the supper is over, is: Should one try to provoke change through intellectual debate or through violent means?
The most disturbing thing about this movie is that it seems to conclude: It depends.
It all begins by accident, when a truck driver named Zack (Bill Paxton) is invited to stay for dinner on a rainy Sunday night at the home of some students in Ames, Iowa. Hostess Pollie (Annabeth Gish) graciously tries to draw Zack into conversation with her housemates and her boyfriend Max (Jonathan Penner).
That turns out to be a fateful error, because what Zack has to say reeks of bigotry. Jews are on his list. And "colored people." Finally, students and "liberals," who let "regular people do all the fighting, working and dying. And you do all the bitching."
Zack's charge that liberals never do anything but complain hits a nerve. But it's not until Zack becomes violent that things get really nasty - and he ends up with a knife in his back.
Pollie goes to pieces. Max, Luke (Courtney B. Vance) and Jude (Cameron Diaz) want to bury the body and forget about the whole thing. Luke, in fact, wants everyone to feel okay about the killing because "the cracker" deserved it.
Pollie and Pete (Ron Eldard), whose arm Zack broke in the struggle, want to call the police immediately.
But as in "Shallow Grave," the characters who first appear most resistant to the horror and immorality of what they have done end up most seduced by it. And vice versa.
Except for Luke, who becomes increasingly committed to the cause of killing people whose views he finds deeply offensive. The fact that Luke is black makes his violence problematic. Probably, writer Dan Rosen wanted to convey that Luke's anger is deeper than that of his white housemates. And is somewhat more justified, right? And forgiven, at least by his housemates, in the end. But it's a wiggly position.
This movie has the irritating habit of slipping around in its own bloody mess. Still, it is almost as thought-provoking as the great, great, great "Six Degrees of Separation."
And while some of its imagery works well, some of it is just confusing and overstated. As thunder crashes and lightning flashes, a raven calls out from a telephone pole that bears a "Missing Child" poster. Then there are the mounds and mounds of tomatoes the students have grown to cover the graves in the backyard.. Max, in fact, slips on one of these as he walks through the yard. GOT IT??!!!
Rosen's script is interesting enough - flaws forgiven - that these directorial excesses are that much more puzzling. Stacy Title apparently hoped to make a mark - not trusting the script and terrific cast to do the job.
"The Last Supper" ought to have stood in its own judgment before attempting to stand in ours. Still, it's a provocative morality play - and provides ample food for thought.
The Last Supper ***
A Sony Pictures release showing at The Grandin Theatre. Rated R for violence and sexually explicit situations. 91 minutes.
*** (R) for violence and sexually explicit situations, a Sony Pictures release showing at the Grandin Theatre, 91 minutes.
LENGTH: Medium: 74 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: Graduate students ponder the murder of a dinner guest inby CNB``The Last Supper.'' color.