The Last Word 2017

     Harriet Lauler wants to control everything about her life and everyone in her life.  She starts to feel burned out and she tries to kill herself.  She didn’t take enough pills or drink enough wine and she lives.  She starts to think about her obituary and what it would say.  She reads one about a woman she knows and none of what was said is true.  Harriet would like to have control over what is said in her obituary before she dies.  She talks to Anne Sherman, the obituary writer for the local newspaper.

     Shirley MacLaine definitely has not had plastic surgery or a face lift and she is 83 years old.  She would control the weather every day if she could?  People who know her should cross the street when they see her headed their way.  She hasn’t given up bothering her former husband and they have been divorced 22 years.  She hasn’t seen or spoken to her daughter (her only child) for many years.  Amada Seyfried must be living in the past (maybe 1988) and that’s how she can devote herself to obituaries?  She dresses like 1988 and her Volvo station wagon may be older?  3* (This movie is OK) 

108 min, Comedy directed by Mark Pellington with Shirley MacLaine, Amanda Seyfried, AnnJewel Lee Dixon, Thomas Sadoski, Philip Baker Hall, Gedde Watanabe, Tom Everett Scott, Joel Murray, Yvette Freeman.

Note:  Imdb 6.6 out of 10, 37% critic 67% audience on Rotten Tomatoes, Roger Ebert 2*, Amazon 4.5* out of 5* with 699 reviews, Metacritic 40 out of 100 with 23 critics 7.4 out of 10 with 7 reviews.

Special Note:  Filmed in Pasadena, Santa Clarita and Los Angeles, California.  Warren Beatty is MacLaine’s brother, 3 years younger.  Veteran British actress Millicent Martin has a quick cameo as Margaret Dumont.  Martin and MacLaine appeared together in What a Way to Go of 1964.  There is a mistake with KOXA the local radio station.  The frequency number is 107.2 FM but in the US FM stations have odd frequencies.  It would need to be 107.1 or 107.3.  The neighborhood is supposed to be Bristol but there isn’t a neighborhood or suburb in LA with this name.  Andalusia is mentioned and it’s an autonomous region in southern Spain with eight provinces.  There is another film with the same title from 2009.