Auteur David Stanley is upfront in the BTS short subject that "The Last Rose" is based on the trend-setting Bertolucci classic "Last Tango in Paris", though he sheepishly doesn't say its name. This quirky porn director moved away from his almost avant-garde Vivid releases to a more mature approach for this Wicked picture, and the care he took shows.
Sasha Grey, looking different with a black wig that even gives her an air of Maria Schneider's iconic style in the original, has a "no names, no strings" affair with grieving widower Randy Spears in an unfurnished loft -clearly echoing the Bernardo soft-core sex opus. A wintry backdrop of snow falling beyond the picture windows, and Stanley's interesting distancing effects by maintaining static long shots in several scenes (virtually unheard of in Adult Cinema) conspire with the acting and script to create and sustain a very serious mood.
I have always been a fan of the morbid in hardcore films, specifically the great work of Gerard Damiano once upon a time like "Memories Within Miss Aggie", "The Story of Joanna" and "Devil in Miss Jones", so Stanley's trying his hand at this genre was personally rewarding for me. One interesting sidelight is that after "Tango" was released early in 1973 (I had seen it at the world premiere the previous October at the New York Film Festival, a great evening in movie history as recorded by Pauline Kael's legendary review), many critics were enthusing about Georgina Spelvin's performance in "Miss Jones" as being comparable to Brando's great turn in "Tango". Stanley completes the circle by re-staging Spelvin's famous bathtub suicide scene here, as Spears' better half Stephanie Swift slits her wrists in a well-staged sequence that gives Spears a chance to demonstrate his acting chops.
Some of the best acting in "Last Rose" is done by all-time greats in NonSex roles: Fred Lincoln lending authority and authenticity to his scene as Nina Hartley's estranged husband recalling in bawdy terms the good old days, and Hartley re-envisioned by Stanley as an actress from the Helen Hayes/Miriam Hopkins school of the 1930s, poignant as Swift's dying mom, cared for tenderly by son-in-law Spears.
The overall mournful, brooding tone of the picture does have Stanley providing a dose of black humor and strangeness, principally in a flashback scene of Swift & Spears as swingers, attending a New Year's Party that is really a sort of orgy and spotlights several guest stars, notably Dana DeArmond without her familiar bangs haircut and Eric Masterson in a threesome wearing a mask. The only stumble D.S. makes (from my vantage point) is a rather flippant ending line for Grey that detracts from the integrity of a fine work of filmmaking.
And it is too bad that this talented writer & director apparently never gave up his cushy life as a contract director for, sequentially, the two leading distributors in the Adult industry to devote his energies to breaking into the mainstream. That's the sad takeaway from watching a fine movie like "The Last Rose" - it relies on the crutch of "explicit sex scenes", afraid to stand on its own two feet without pandering to a horny audience that has proved in the decade since it was shot not to care at all about story or characterization.
Sasha Grey, looking different with a black wig that even gives her an air of Maria Schneider's iconic style in the original, has a "no names, no strings" affair with grieving widower Randy Spears in an unfurnished loft -clearly echoing the Bernardo soft-core sex opus. A wintry backdrop of snow falling beyond the picture windows, and Stanley's interesting distancing effects by maintaining static long shots in several scenes (virtually unheard of in Adult Cinema) conspire with the acting and script to create and sustain a very serious mood.
I have always been a fan of the morbid in hardcore films, specifically the great work of Gerard Damiano once upon a time like "Memories Within Miss Aggie", "The Story of Joanna" and "Devil in Miss Jones", so Stanley's trying his hand at this genre was personally rewarding for me. One interesting sidelight is that after "Tango" was released early in 1973 (I had seen it at the world premiere the previous October at the New York Film Festival, a great evening in movie history as recorded by Pauline Kael's legendary review), many critics were enthusing about Georgina Spelvin's performance in "Miss Jones" as being comparable to Brando's great turn in "Tango". Stanley completes the circle by re-staging Spelvin's famous bathtub suicide scene here, as Spears' better half Stephanie Swift slits her wrists in a well-staged sequence that gives Spears a chance to demonstrate his acting chops.
Some of the best acting in "Last Rose" is done by all-time greats in NonSex roles: Fred Lincoln lending authority and authenticity to his scene as Nina Hartley's estranged husband recalling in bawdy terms the good old days, and Hartley re-envisioned by Stanley as an actress from the Helen Hayes/Miriam Hopkins school of the 1930s, poignant as Swift's dying mom, cared for tenderly by son-in-law Spears.
The overall mournful, brooding tone of the picture does have Stanley providing a dose of black humor and strangeness, principally in a flashback scene of Swift & Spears as swingers, attending a New Year's Party that is really a sort of orgy and spotlights several guest stars, notably Dana DeArmond without her familiar bangs haircut and Eric Masterson in a threesome wearing a mask. The only stumble D.S. makes (from my vantage point) is a rather flippant ending line for Grey that detracts from the integrity of a fine work of filmmaking.
And it is too bad that this talented writer & director apparently never gave up his cushy life as a contract director for, sequentially, the two leading distributors in the Adult industry to devote his energies to breaking into the mainstream. That's the sad takeaway from watching a fine movie like "The Last Rose" - it relies on the crutch of "explicit sex scenes", afraid to stand on its own two feet without pandering to a horny audience that has proved in the decade since it was shot not to care at all about story or characterization.