THE LAST PATROL / THE LAST WARRIOR (Sheldon Lettich, 1999)

[drago]

I think this film is really awful dolph acting is holding the film the plot was good but it was used terribly.The milkman bit really annoyed me.i know a massive earthquake has occured but how did a band of weirdos all end up at the base.Where did all the prison officers go and the army base there has to be more than 1 soldier there.The action scenes are scarce and when there shown there brutal also the singing choir is stupid.the coloured women acting is terrible shes all happy than in a second shes nearly in tears saying<a change is coming i feel it>I know some dolphs fans like it but its my least favorite dolph movie i really dont like this movie at all.

[Travis]

I agree.

[shooby]

Last Warrior is Dolph Lundgren's Worst Movie. I regret Owning It.

Oh no, it's not the best dolph's movie, but it's not the worst too. The worst for me -> agent red

[Tom]

I get a reply from the director when I asked him about working with Dolph and Last Patrol on Imdb. Interesting bit of info.

"I agree with your assessment of "Last Patrol." It was a lame script to begin with, written by a couple of folks who had only worked in TV and had no experience with action movies. One of them, Pam Long, is actually a very well-known writer of soap operas. The producer, Jacob Kotzky, got me involved because he wanted to steer it towards becoming an action movie. I signed on figuring I would do a re-write, and Dolph signed on figuring the same. Unfortunately, the two writers were also Executive Producers. Dolph and I soon found out, to our dismay, that I was contractually prohibited from changing a word of their precious script without their approval. On top of that, we had an anemic budget to work with; far, far less than the purported "8.2 million dollars" that's listed on the IMDB site. You can't stage decent action scenes unless you've got time and resources, and both of those, unfortunately, cost money; money which we didn't have.

As far as my opinion about action star team-ups... Sure, I'm all for them, but I'm not the guy who's writing the checks. Various producers have stated the same opinion to me regarding this subject, and not one of them believes you get more bang for your buck with these combinations. Sure, the combination of Van Damme and Dolph in "Universal Soldier" was cool (for the fans), but "Time Cop" came out afterwards, only had Van Damme, and made more money than the Van Damme & Dolph combination. So there you have it. As far as producers and studios are concerned, the numbers don't lie, and that's the bottom line for them."

[Moltisanti]

Pretty honest take from the director. It was a really bad movie. I thought I heard that it was planned to be a TV series at one time but after seeing the film I'm glad it wasn't. Thankfully Lundgren has returned to making better films.

When it comes to the pairings I suppose it does come down to economics. Having 2 name stars in these type of movies may look good on the box but if it isn't a good film then those names won't mean a thing. Instead of another team-up with Van Damme, Lundgren would do better to try and play a villain against a more current actor like The Rock or Jason Statham.

[Mosquito]

Tom, thanks for that quote. Really interesting reading and I agree with Moltisanti, it is a nice surprise to read such honest stuff. I also agree with him that Dolph should be the villain playing against an A-list actor again. He was great in Johnny Mnenonic (and I can't repeat enough that I think it was a very good movie) and it would give him more exposure to an "average" audience, not only us B-action and/or Lundgren fans.

Regarding the money: Of course Time Cop made more because at that time Van Damme was already better known. And didn't they have a much bigger budget than for UniSol? But if they don't want to afford an expensive buddy they can still go for an unknown one. I don't know how much Brandon Lee was paid for SILT but he and Dolph were a great team and it totally worked! Instead of seeing Dolph yet again as head of a troup of more or less skilled or intelligent fighters / lost people /whatever doing another buddy movie with an equal or almost equal partner (regarding the amount of lines or whatever, not equal looks or character) would be better. Silent Trigger was a nice step into that direction.

[bomaz]

yes ! this is a great idea ! Dolph would be a great vilain in front of Jason Statham in a "transporter 3" , who knows !

[Moltisanti]

Definitely, when I see ads for movies like TRANSPORTER 2 or other modern action films I always wonder why a guy like Lundgren isn't selected as the villain. I suppose part of it is his own choice but he's played such great bad guys in ROCKY 4, UNIVERSAL SOLDIER, and MNEMONIC that I'd like to see him try that again. There just aren't many great villains in those movies today, though Bob Hoskins was good in UNLEASHED but that's a different variety of bad guy.

[hansson55]

I just watched Last Patrol again and I must say that I can understand why every one hates it so much. The first hour is great, the action in the end might not be his best work but an original and interesting story keeps it together. If it hade become a series that I believe was the idea from the start I think it might have worked.
What do you think?

[Mosquito]

I think it sucks from the beginning to the end. The characters are just preposterous and the movie is just plain boring most of the time.

[Jox]

I think Dolph's character had some interesting personal issues to deal with even though the rest was cheesy... I'm probably the only one but I like the finale where Rainbow (the teacher woman) appears and screams in tongues, the scene has a mystical feel to it that I enjoy... could have been much better for sure...

[Craigie-Boy]

So are we glad that it never developed into the proposed series, or do any of you think that the characters could have improved if they'd had the room to develop that a series would have given them?

[Jox]

Wether it's Blackjack or The Last Patrol, I don't think it would have been good for Dolph's career to be these series because the producers didn't care much about the final product in either case.

[Dawn]

I thought The Last Patrol was absolutel cheesy with no merit to it at all. BlackJack has a lot of good points to it, however the story needed some work. I was excited to see Last Patrol, I was assuming it would be a pretty good post-apocalyptic movie with some scenes of destruction. The whole movie was just plain weird. Absolutely the last Dolph movie I ever bought before renting first.

[Graham]

I thought The Last Patrol was absolutel cheesy with no merit to it at all. BlackJack has a lot of good points to it, however the story needed some work. I was excited to see Last Patrol, I was assuming it would be a pretty good post-apocalyptic movie with some scenes of destruction. The whole movie was just plain weird.

I agree Dawn. I had high hopes for this, expecting something in the Mad Max vein but was a big disappointment, being very boring much of the time.

Of all the Dolph films I've seen (which is not them all, but I've seen the majority now), this is the only one bar Masters of the Universe I wouldn't want to watch again.