Last Exit to Brooklyn (1989)

One of Leigh's best performances in a role that seemed to be written for her. You are rooting for her or ANYONE among the denizens of the strikebound Brooklyn docks to find a way to a better life but at the same time know that no one will make it. The Pieta like still-life after the climatic was a wonderful comment on both the content of the movie itself and the searing quality that some art can have.

It is on my list of most depressing movies, which includes "The Damned", "The Pawnbroker", "The Night Porter".

Fmovies: The picture of an innocent 1950s promulgated by films of the time was thoroughly refuted with the book Last Exit to Brooklyn, which portrayed a world of sex and violence that would ring just as true if written about the present age. It was a dark book, and the movie is appropriately downbeat. It is a movie with no especially good people. Some of the people are likable, but even the likable ones are not really good people; some are criminals, thugs and users, some are more foolish and selfish and clueless (and at least one was made nicer than in the book).

The movie is done very effectively. There are some memorable scenes, and Jennifer Jason Leigh gives yet another memorable performance mixing, as usual, intense character and clothes removal.

I didn't think it was a great movie, but if I were more prone to dark, hopeless movies, as I was when younger, perhaps I would think so. It's certainly interesting.

The way "the golden era" really was. The statement on the state of the 1950s presented in Last Exit is shocking, enlightening, and well supported by beautiful performances of an ensemble cast. Jennifer Jason Leigh as Tralala, a hooker WITHOUT a heart of gold (for a change) and Burt Young as a union hard hitter coming to terms with his sexuality are most notably inspiring. Excellent direction and a powerful script make Last Exit emotionally draining, and compelling.

Last Exit to Brooklyn fmovies. Having been born in NYC during the late fifties it was important for me to read, see and finally own Last Exit To Brooklyn. Our household was always a violent and unhappy one. None of us lived in the streets like the characters in the film but the violence from there was definitely reflected in our day to day life. Heartwrenchingly faithful to the mood and sentiment of Hubert Selby's important novel I am continuously surprised at how films like this are overlooked in a larger, classic sense. This is not a pleasant film. The German direction and influence put me in mind of Fassbiner's Berlin Alexanderplatz. There was a similar grotesque as well as aesthetic beauty that I found to be very compelling. Most of all, however, I was remarkably impressed by Jennifer Jason Leigh's performance. She gave us the flip side of Marylin Monroe, the antithesis if you will. I'm pretty sure that she has not, as yet, received Oscar recognition and am puzzled how her performance in Last Exit did not get her a nod. This film come highly recommended.

Harry, Stephen Lange the union shop steward who's in good with the president of the dock workers union, Boyce, Jerry Orbach,In that he has a union expense account which he uses to finance his secret life. Married to his wife Mary, Maria Danziger, Harry goes out to expensive bars and nightclubs with high-class transvestites that he picks up.

Seeing that Harry is abusing that privilege Boyce stops it and makes Harry pay back the money that he took from the union treasury out of his paycheck. Sick and depressed Harry gets himself drunk one night and tries to have his way with one of the local neighborhood boys. Which leads to the boys friends brutally beating Harry to the point where he was within an inch of his life from being dead and ending up being literally crucified in an empty back-lot; This is the level of brutality in this movie. A violent brutal and at the same time shockingly honest movie about life in Brooklyn New York circa 1952. During a long and savage dock strike on Brooklyn's heavily industrialized Bush Terminal waterfront. The film is truly disturbing with a shocking and vicious gang rape inter-cut with a baby shower for one of the unions members "Big" Joe, Burt Young, daughters child at the local union hall. These are just two of many such jolting scenes in the movie.

An excellent cast with Stephen Lang, as the union shop steward who's problems are more then just the job that he has on the docks. With Jennifer Jason Leigh, as the bar girl who likes to date and then roll servicemen with the help of her friends to get their money and ends up paying for what she did in more ways then one. With Jerry Orbach as the feisty and two fisted union president who sticks to his guns and in the end gets what he wants for himself and his union members and many many more good actors and the parts that they play in the movie.

"Last Exit to Brooklyn" is a very hard movie to watch but if you want a film with brutal realism and fine acting and photography as well as a story that will grip you right from the start and hold on to you long after the movie is over this is it.

Last Exit to Brooklyn (1989) is based on the book by Hubert Selby Jr. about a group of working class during a labour strike in early 1950's in the gritty streets of Brooklyn. German Uli Edel directed this and Desmond Nakano wrote the screenplay. Stephen Lang plays Harry Black, the leader of the strike unit and Jennifer Jason Leigh is Tralala, a lost soul who works as a hooker for the various soldiers and other drunken males that use the services of the hookers drinking beer and acting dirty. The film explores the forms of love and how desperate we are for it, because living without it is not too easy or even possible as it belongs to being a human being.

The film opens with a line from the Bible which thickens the theme of the film and the above thing I wrote. Soon we get introduced to the main characters who don't seem to be too happy. Harry doesn't care about his wife and child but seems to be very attracted by a sensual and very attractive transvestite who lives with other transvestites in their own apartment while the "straight" prostitutes are mainly in the streets. This relationship between Harry and the transvestite(s) is very great and emotional and depicts the nature of love and caring as it doesn't always involve just different sexes together. Just watching Harry's eyes when he first sees his new interest in the street shows how powerful cinema can be without one single word.

Another important character is of course Tralala and she is also involved in the film's harrowing and almost unbearably sadistic and ugly end scene that finally (or what happens after that) makes the film a very strong experience. She is completely lost even though she meets a nice sailor who truly falls in love with her even though Tralala doesn't understand it at once. She understands it during the end scene as well as the meaning of the crying boy she first gets to meet during the act. Last Exit to Brooklyn explores love and caring between human beings and how strong it can be. Tralala wouldn't survive without the motorcycle boy, or she would live the rest of her life in pure emptiness and void.

The film handles also violence and weak human nature desperate for sex and other of his instincts. The violence is very harsh and off putting and the film's view of life is dark to say the least. Violence is here as unjustified and brutal as in real life, too, and maybe that's why so many seem to dislike the film and its honesty saying it is "unpleasant and repellent".

The sets are very impressive and the atmosphere in this film is all the time like the actors could any minute start singing and dancing their lines! This creates also a very strong feel of danger and "clock ticking" as the workers and strikers wait for the decision by the authorities and it is like it is night all the time. The film feels like a depiction of the world's last day that still may not be the last but no one knows it yet for sure.

Equally great with the photography and sets is the music by Mark Knopfler. The beautiful theme is played during the film restrainedly and it makes the strong events and situations even stronger, as always a great soundtrack does. The very conclusion is pretty optimistic and again the music makes it look even brighter and hopeful. Some characters didn't manage to learn before it was too late, but at least those who did have a chance for a better tomorrow.

The major negative sides in the film are in the occasional restlessnes