Last Heist, The (2016)
Drew Tinnin
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Starring Henry Rollins, Kristina Klebe, Nicholas Principe
Directed by Mike Mendez
The Last Heist will ultimately serve as your personal Henry Rollins fan barometer: Will you watch everything the man does, or do you have your limits? Personally, I’d consider myself more of a completist, but that’s probably because I have a growing desire to see Rollins become the next straight-to-VOD sensation, picking up the mantle from Jean-Claude Van Damme, Steven Seagal, and Dolph Lundgren. (His catch phrase could be “Get in the van!”)
Sadly, the limited screen time Rollins enjoys isn’t enough to elevate this lowbrow high-concept heist movie beyond its uninspired execution.
Opening with an example of just how private a safety deposit box can really be, The Last Heist begins with Bernard (Rollins) checking in on his personal collection of eyeballs. Unbeknownst to the group of bank robbers that show up, Bernard is a religious zealot driven to kill in order to free the souls of his victims.
I know what you’re thinking: How can this possibly go wrong? Well…
With every character being fairly unlikable and one-dimensional, there just isn’t anyone worth rooting for in The Last Heist so the “siege with a twist” premise goes off the rails until you’re really just waiting for Bernard to stab everyone repeatedly. Led by their smarmy leader with an agenda, Paul (Torrance Coombs), the mostly boneheaded bank robbers mull about with way too much attitude until they stumble across Bernard, who then gives a mini sermon and attacks.
The character with the most promise is the foul-mouthed, gun-toting Tracey (Klebe), but she’s underutilized and underdeveloped. The fact that Klebe is an established genre actress with a fan base after her turn in Rob Zombie’s Halloween and smaller roles in Chillerama and Tales of Halloween should have warranted a part that showcased her talents and capitalized on her horror-heavy resume. Instead of a cat and mouse game within the main story, a standoff between Bernard and Tracey happens too early, and the best sequence in the film is over by the beginning of the second reel.
Rollins himself is in The Last Heist just enough, however, and makes his screen time count in several scenes where he ups the creep factor by taking on a Christ-like responsibility to purge the world of the wicked. His righteous rampages may be too much of an excuse for excessive gore (tapping into what was probably an enormous blood budget), but Bernard’s eye-gouging modus operandi serves up the horror element quite effectively.
There’s a lot of promise here but not enough passion. Containing elements of Die Hard and Carpenter’s Assault on Precinct 13 isn’t enough; there needs to be characters, on both sides, to champion and get behind in order for there to be any satisfying payoff. That’s why the ending of The Last Heist doesn’t have the emotional pop it should. If the idea was more developed with a little more money thrown its way, this intriguing setup could have been saved; but unfortunately, the vault is left empty.
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Film
Categorized:Reviews
