BlazeLime Strong and Moving!

GurlyIamBeach Instant Favorite.

Hayden Kane There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Tobias Burrows It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

mmallon4 1977 was a year of some high profile bombs which later achieved some cult status such as Cross of Iron, Sorcerer and Twilight's Last Gleaming. This partially came about from the competition from a certain film called Star Wars which offered a more optimistic and hopeful cinematic experience. As someone who has mixed feeling on New Hollywood, these movies don't deserve to be ignored the way they are and are some of the best hidden gems of the 1970's. Likewise the trashy, conspiracy theory concept of Twilight's Last Gleaming would be the ire of many high brow critics but it's the high concept which makes Twilight's Last Gleaming irresistible and helps the viewer to look past the implausibility of the premise. This is a film which trades it's logic for emotion and is aware of its own implausibility ("How in the hell does some joker walk into a top secret installation and get control of the most sophisticated weapons system in the world?"). As a layman it feels believable within the context of the movie but it's always fun to ask, could it happen in real life?Twilight's Last Gleaming features an ironic use of 'My Country Tis of Thee' during the opening and closing credits; it's not exactly a happy movie. Oddly however Jerry Goldsmith's score sounds like something from an action/adventure blockbuster and is even John Williams like at time. The action takes place over a single day in what can be described as Dog Day Afternoon like scenario in a missile silo for a film which you could mistaken as being based on a stage play with its handful of sets and lengthy scenes. On my first viewing I wasn't convinced the running time was justified but watching it again I was hooked. Twilight's Last Gleaming takes is set in the future year of November 16th, 1981 although it's not stated why it's set on this particular date.Burt Lancaster was still getting some great roles into the 1970's. He still had his mojo and now with a beat up face to boot. As one of the character's in the film puts it, "with that rhetoric he could be elected governor in ten states". Lancaster's role of General Lawrence Dell draws parallels to his role of General Scott in the political thriller Seven Days In May; a megalomaniac going to extremes in order to fulfil his agenda despite the risks to the United States and the world as a whole. He may be trying to provide a catharsis to the pain and anger of Vietnam veterans but at what cost? Lancaster and co star Paul Winfred have an enjoyable chemistry between them and provide comic relief with their back and forth. It's interesting seeing Lancaster sparring off with actors much younger than him as well as dropping some F-bombs. On top of that there is something surreal about watching Burt Lancaster drinking a can of Coca-Cola. Product placements for Coca-Cola appear at several points throughout the film with Coke vending machines in clear sight; I guess they have to answer to The Coca-Cola Company.Twilight's Last Gleaming consists of veteran actors talking some serious stuff. The discussions in the Oval Office scene are alot to take in on one viewing ("Ralph! Are you comparing Vietnam to Hitler?!" - It always goes back to Hitler). The movie is full of entertaining one liners - "It's like Star Trek all over again", "Come on this isn't Disneyland" and my favourite, "There are no midgets in the United States Air Force". The oldest among this cast is Melvyn Douglas, the prime example of an actor who got better with age as clearly evident here; full of powerful subdue comments and monologues ("The beginning of the end of mankind, in graphic black and white").The film's extensive use of split screen works remarkable well and does not feel like a gimmick creating a unique viewing experience; the split screen here is clearly not an afterthought. The entire sequence in which missiles are about to be launched is presented entirely in split screen with events being monitored in three different locations in order to heighten the tension. The scene itself is one scary sequence with the pandemonium and the sight of the missiles rising (the model of the silo exterior is shown on screen just briefly enough not to notice they are models). The President himself describes it best - "The opening of the doors of hell".The President in Twilight's Last Gleaming played by Charles Durning is not an idealistic representation of a president nor is he massively charming and ultimately a bit drab. However we do get to see his human side during a scene in which he talks to his General alone and admits to being scared out of his mind. At the beginning of the film there is a scene in which the President has a conversation with a character played by Roscoe Lee Brown. It doesn't have purpose in the plot but does set the tone of the White House scenes and foreshadows the rest of the movie ("If I grant Zabat sanctuary, I give approval to every dissident with a cause and a gun").The ending of Twilight's Last Gleaming all comes down to the question of whether or not society can deal with the truth? With widespread distrust in the government starting with the assassination of JFK and not getting any better with the Watergate scandal, would the President's cabinet reveal the movie's purported truth on the Vietnam War to the American public like he ordered before being shot down in an attempt to take down the two men holding him hostage. However was his death even an accident or did they intend to let him be shot down in order to keep the truth hidden; it does seem odd that no medical aid is given to him after being shot. The ending is left ambiguous and the viewer is left to think about it.

orbitsville-1 Things are far too strange here to just say "so bad it's good". Far, far too strange.Instead, let's say there are three ways to make a film out of a Walter Wager novel. First we have the Telefon example: do a straight-up, linear, by-the-numbers thriller that is so straightforward and escapist that you get a rather wooden, unmemorable--if somewhat entertaining--potboiler. Nothing risked, nothing lost nothing gained. That's Telefon.Or, there's the 58 Minutes/Die Hard 2 model: change main-character Malone to John McClane, keep the airport-in-jeopardy setting while massively rewriting the novel so it works as a movie sequel to something it wasn't even connected to in the first place, and make sure it's more exciting than Telefon. Your cinematic thriller has soul, and is safely attached to a successful franchise. And for goodness sakes, stay away from polemic, political commentary or deep meaning.This brings us to our third case of filming a Walter Wager escapist thriller tome: attach thought-provoking socio-political concerns to the escapism. Try to address some lingering bitterness or cynicism in the US macro-psyche over, say, the Viet Nam war. Homegrown terrorists as anti-heroes, trying to out the government's secrets over a futile conflict that lingered on as a political peeing contest that cost too many lives, by way of a captured missile base. Rogue Major Burt Lancaster tries to stare down US President Charles Durning with nine nuclear warheads set to ferment, unless some dirty laundry is aired right quick. Of course it's previous administrations' decisions that Durning's version of the President is getting slapped around for, but that's all part of the...fun? Uh, no, sorry, all part of the moral conundrum. The fun is somewhere else in the movie...and quickly seeping out of the movie, the more director Robert Aldrich decides this is not just going to be escapist thrills.Personally, I feel the movie gets most obviously unwieldy, and dangerously over-ambitious, once it starts to abandon Burt Lancaster, in favor of Charles Durning. There's a big shift in focus as soon as we start hanging out with Durning and his boardroom full of mucky-mucks--and shut-in Lancaster becomes sort of a bit player in the proceedings, even though he's got nine nuclear missiles. This switch in character focus directly corresponds to the diminishing thrills, and the emphasis on deeper questions and concerns that Robert Aldrich decided were in tune with the USA zeitgeist of 1977. Less booby-traps, ambushes, shoot-outs, torture sessions and stealth attacks gone wrong--more talk, talk, talk, by suits, suits, suits, sitting comfortably in chairs, chairs, chairs, who wants more coffee? Meanwhile, the split-screen effect used deftly during action sequences (much in the way of the TV show 24 years later) gives way to less suspenseful split-screen sequences showing Burt Lancaster almost looking bored while the President dithers.Then the ending comes along and finds a really unexpected and daring way to combine stark cynical commentary with a shockingly brutal final confrontation such as you would find in only a truly bold and cutting-edge thriller. And so, I'm going to do what the movie does: I'm going to end a review of what sounds like a bad movie deserving its flop status by shifting gears and saying Bravo! Why? Well, 8 out of 10 for this because--despite everything wrongheaded about the project- -I can honestly say that there is no other thriller, or quasi-thriller stuffed with deep thoughts and dark commentary, quite like it. It's a glorious misfire. I didn't take it seriously, but it had me trying. More lively than Telefon, less cheesy fun than Die Hard 2, and a unique experiment: sort of Inside Man meets Sum Of All Fears meets Point/Counterpoint. Crashes and burns in one of the most compelling ways I've ever seen, and that ain't hay!

MARIO GAUCI Dismissed upon original release as a "pedestrian potboiler", TWILIGHT'S LAST GLEAMING (a phrase taken from "The Star Spangled Banner") has subsequently come to be regarded as a belated masterpiece in Robert Aldrich's career . Actually. Aldrich was merely a hired hand on the project and only managed to secure the services of one of his long-time crew members (editor Michael Luciano, albeit sharing that credit with two others); even so, Jerry Goldsmith (standing in for the absent DeVol) delivers a typically fine musical backing. It was also the fourth collaboration between the director and leading man Burt Lancaster (as a disgraced but vehemently patriotic former U.S.A.F. General) who heads a remarkable cast where a known face virtually inhabits every major role; in this regard, Melvyn Douglas (as the Secretary of Defence), Charles Durning (as the U.S. President), Gerald S. O'Loughlin (as the Presidential aide) and Paul Winfield (as a dishonorably discharged soldier) emerge as particularly outstanding. In this day and age replete with bland, unnecessary remakes of past successes, it is refreshing to come across an older movie that stands no chance whatsoever of being deigned with that dubious honor; not only that: I sincerely believe that, as long as the war in Iraq rages on, it will also never be released on DVD...but I would love to be proved wrong by Warners. Ironically enough, I watched this on the very day that Italy was gloriously burying (via an all-day-long TV coverage) six of its sons who lost their lives in a suicide attack while serving in Afghanistan! Set in the near future of 1981 (i.e. four years after production), technically, TWILIGHT'S LAST GLEAMING can be considered a science-fiction movie and, in fact, it is virtually as prophetic as John Frankeneheimer's THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE (1962) vis-a-vis the eventual shooting of the U.S. President (lest we forget, an assassination attempt on then-President Ronald Reagan was actually made in 1981)! In plot terms, the film resides somewhere between Frankenheimer's SEVEN DAYS IN MAY (1964; in which Burt Lancaster is a renegade U.S. General who sets a coup d'etat in motion) and THE BEDFORD INCIDENT (1965; in which tyrannical naval officer Richard Widmark drives one particular officer serving under him to nuclear holocaust) and, indeed, Widmark plays Lancaster's antagonistic former superior in GLEAMING as well! The highlight of the film is the central discussion sequence in which the real reasons behind the Vietnam War are revealed to a disbelieving President by Secretary Of State Joseph Cotten; in this regard, it is refreshing to have the U.S. President - not to mention Burt Lancaster - lose it and let rip with four-letter words and other assorted profanities (perhaps most surprisingly when uttering a "Screw Church!" very early on). Another unexpected but most welcome element were the occasional dollops of black comedy which serve to alleviate the ever-increasing tension of the situation - like when Durning and O'Loughlin exchange wisecracks while discussing the possibility of the former losing his life in the process of his ransom exchange meeting with Lancaster, Winfield and Burt Young (who have commandeered a military base capable of launching nine missiles) or when Winfield entertains the notion that the approaching President may be a double or that the security cameras are showing the surrounding grounds of their military base as uninhabited because the Army has employed midget snipers!! Necessitated by the increasingly intricate train of events, Aldrich makes admirable use of the split-screen technique to keep up with the Presidential discussions, Widmark's military maneuvers and Lancaster's agonizing waiting; incidentally, the latter would soon star in one of the first (and most effective) films dealing with the Vietnam War, GO TELL THE SPARTANS (1978; with which I am familiar and have just acquired). Despite the film's considerable length of 144 minutes, it emerges an exciting and thought-provoking political thriller, a genre which, personally, never fails to engross me; having said that, there was a shorter version prepared for European distribution which ran for 122 minutes and the film also sported the alternate title of NUCLEAR COUNTDOWN for some theatrical engagements. Thankfully, I came across a good VHS-sourced copy (albeit panned-and-scanned) of the full-length version from CBS/Fox Video which, as I said earlier, will most probably have to do for an indefinite period of time...

avb1934 I agree with the general drift of the comments logged to this date. I would add only this: as I watched John McCain expunge the Bush administration from the recent history of the United States this film sprang to mind. To say more would spoil the climax of the film. Burt Lancaster gave master classes in film acting in many of his movies, and in none more so that in Twilight. The other actors were superb. I had the strange experience of seeing the film on network television in 1977, and as the closing credits began to roll, my phone rang. It was a person I had not seen or heard from in over a year, her first words being: "Did you see THAT?" So much for Twilight and telepathy.