Analysis of the film Last Looks: who killed Monica and why. Last Looks (2021): film plot summary, description, meaning of the ending, who the killer is, similar movies.
Country: USA
Genre: thriller, detective, comedy, crime, action
Year of production: 2021
Director: Tim Kirkby
Actors: Charlie Hunnam, Mel Gibson, Lucy Fry, Rupert Friend
Slogan: “This town is a bad place to be a good guy”.
The leisurely plot of the film Last Looks makes us talk about this film as both a neo-noir and an indie film. Don’t expect action scenes here – this is primarily a meditative film. Last Looks is a film-mood, a film-contemplation. He talks about how not everything in life is as simple as it seems. In addition, this is a wonderful satire about the underbelly of Hollywood life.
Plot Analysis
Brief description of the contents of the picture. The plot centers on two heroes. One of them is Charlie Waldo. He used to be a tough Los Angeles cop, a real “star” of his department. However, no one is immune from mistakes. Charlie also committed it during the investigation – he focused on false testimony and, as a result, sent an innocent person to prison. He was unable to somehow influence the fate of the convict, and this ultimately led to the fact that he began to lead a very secluded, almost reclusive lifestyle. Now he lives in the forest and all he cares about is protecting the environment.
The second hero of the film is the eccentric actor Alistair Pinch. Being an icon of Hollywood, he modestly calls himself “second only to Marlon Brando.” Now he has his own show, in which he plays the role of a judge. From time to time he gets drunk and beats up the staff. At some point, Pinch’s wife Monica is killed and he becomes the main defendant in this case. The police really like this idea, because the “star” has no alibi, and Alistair doesn’t remember what happened the day before because he was very drunk. According to the media, he faces life imprisonment, but he tries not to lose heart and takes care of his little daughter to the best of his ability.
Soon his ex-girlfriend Lorena comes to see Charlie, she is a detective. Lorena offers him a job: the Hollywood studio Black Bear, headed by Wilson Sikorsky, wants to hire him to investigate the Pinch case. Soon after this, Lorena disappears and the detective, assuming that there is a connection between the murder of Mrs. Pinch and the disappearance of her ex-girlfriend, gets to work.
In search of a clue to the death of Monica Pinch, Charlie meets kindergarten teacher Jane White, who previously taught the actor’s daughter. Sympathy arises between them and Charlie soon realizes that he is infatuated with the girl.
Meanwhile, Charlie faces interference: someone doesn’t want him to handle the case. He meets with Alistair again and tries to find out from him whether Monica had enemies. The old man cleverly avoids answering, and then invites the detective to have a drink. Waldo understands that he did this for a reason, but with meaning. And in fact, the heavily overindulged Pinch unexpectedly asks if Charlie knows whether Jane is going to leave his child. He admits that he behaved “like a brute” towards her and immediately stipulates that he was actually married at that time.
Shocked Charlie (he could not have imagined anything like this before) begins to guess something. He visits Jane again and tells her that on the night of Monica’s murder, Alistair was corresponding with someone who promised to come. Isn’t it with her? The girl is very embarrassed and the detective calls her for a serious conversation.
It turns out that she had an affair not only with Alistair, but also with many other representatives of Hollywood bohemia. Any one of them could be accused of interfering with Charlie. Moreover, they did this not because of Monica Pinch, but out of fear that the media would find out about their affairs.
Trying to understand the meaning of everything that is happening, Charlie asks Jane to tell him everything – and without lying. The girl says that she really expected Pinch to leave Monica, but he was in no hurry to get a divorce. Moreover, one day he mentioned that his wife was calling him to go to England. This means that in this case he will have to leave the show, which pays off well and brings good money both to him and to everyone associated with him – and in particular to Sikorsky. One night he texted her and invited her over to talk. When Jane arrived, Monica opened the door for her. It turns out that she wrote the text message from her drunken husband’s phone – she just wanted to look at her rival. Jane hurried to leave, and in the morning she learned that Monica Pinch was dead.
Charlie asks if she is really pregnant with Alistair’s child and sees in the girl’s eyes that his interpretation is correct. Towards the end of the film, he visits Sikorsky in his office and reports that he knows who killed Monica and asks him if he knows Jane White. Sikorsky believes that the killer has been found and the case is closed. However, Waldo asks him not to rush to conclusions…
Last Looks Ending explained
Explanation of the ending of the picture. At the end of the film, the detective suggests that Sikorsky was having an affair with Monica – he spent time with her while Alistair was having love affairs with Jane.
On that fateful night, Mrs. Pinch found out about Jane’s pregnancy and called Sikorsky. She warned him that she would tell Alistair about her affair and force him to leave the show and go to England. Sikorsky could not possibly lose the show, which brought him good profits. He came to Monica’s house and tried to persuade her, but she was adamant. A quarrel ensued, then a fight, during which the enraged Sikorsky accidentally killed Monica.
The hype around Alistair was beneficial to him because the show’s ratings were off the charts. Taking advantage of this, he hired an outsider, Charlie Waldo, well aware of his controversial reputation. He didn’t need the truth – he only needed a “continuation of the banquet”, during which golden rain rained down on him…
After listening to all this, the shocked Sikorsky does not try to deny it, and Waldo takes him out onto the street, where a police car is already parked. However, Sikorsky, taking advantage of the confusion of the law enforcement officers, escapes. Charlie chases after him, overtakes him and a fight ensues, during which the criminal almost kills him. The detective is saved by an old acquaintance whom he has encountered more than once during the investigation.
At the very end of the film, Charlie meets with Alistair, who warmly thanks the detective and tells him that he has stopped drinking and is now going to become a good father. This is probably the meaning of the ending of the movie Waldo.
Who’s the killer
Monica Pinch was killed by Wilson Sikorsky. Most likely, he did this unintentionally, but the truth was disadvantageous to him.
The meaning of the film Last Looks
The script for the film was written by Howard Michael Gould, author of the Charlie Waldo series of books. The writer’s works are distinguished by an ironic tone and sometimes quite black humor. The film by Tim Kirkby was shot in approximately the same style.
Last Looks is an imperfect private detective. However, he does not go on a drinking binge and does not suffer from PTSD – having chosen solitude, he is interested in environmental problems, meditates and reflects on life.
The accused Alistair Pinch is also not a stereotypical character. He is successful, famous, talented and well educated. His relationship with his wife had always been difficult, and love (if there was any, of course) had long faded away. That is why Mr. Pinch, being a wonderful actor, does not even try to portray grief. Moreover, he does not seem interested in the investigation and has no intention of helping Waldo.
The plot of the film cannot be called linear and predictable. Constantly balancing between stereotyping and breaking templates, it is based on playing with the viewer. This game consists in the fact that, under the sauce of a detective line, we are served a comedy that makes fun of modern mores. The light “ecological” seasoning is from the same opera as the line with the murder: it was needed for the picture to see the light of day and, perhaps, find its audience.
Tim Kirkby’s film has a hidden meaning. Unlike the “boyish” films of Ritchie and Tarantino, Last Looks is practically devoid of scenes of violence – and this is not just like that…
So, a former policeman, somewhat wild in his seclusion and loving nature, goes out into the world and meets a man who seems to have come to our time in a time machine straight from the nineties. Pinch is a man of the old formation. In their analysis of the film, viewers note that Charlie and Alistair, despite all their differences, are brought together by the fact that they are both honest. This is why they eventually become close. The collaboration of these two leads to a sound, entirely constructive agenda for the future, based on conservative values.
The imperfection of the heroes plays into their hands. Charlie, who initially became a recluse, does not reflect on the fact that his wife left him, and he has no problems with alcohol or drugs. He hid from the world only because he could not forgive himself for the fact that it was his fault that an innocent person went to prison. He takes on the Pinch case so that the same thing does not happen now – that is, he wants to atone for his guilt and help someone who, although not a role model, certainly did not commit a crime.
Alistair, for all his eccentricity, constantly remembers and talks about the main thing – love for his children. For their sake you need to live – and change for the better. The refrain successfully combines the idea of the importance of love for the younger generation with the idea of caring for the planet. However, it is expressed much more clearly and convincingly, and this is precisely the essence of the film. There is nothing strange here, because we are talking about fundamental values.
With their strange, atypical, sometimes very awkward film, Tim Kirkby and Howard Michael Gould are trying to force the viewer to wake up, stop being a consumer, stop devouring himself and remember the half-forgotten morality. That is, we can assume that a new trend will soon appear in cinema – the return of conservative values and the rejection of new ideas, each of which seems crazier than the previous one.
However, Hollywood is deceiving. Perhaps there will be no renaissance, but a ray of hope flashing through the endless darkness has only appeared to us…
Similar films
Here are several films similar in meaning and partly in plot to the film Last Looks:
- “Kiss Bang Bang” (USA, 2005). Two thieves rob a children’s toy store. The alarm goes off, but one of them manages to escape from the police and end up at a Hollywood party.
- “Goodfellas” (USA, UK, 2016). Private detective Holland March and his partner investigate the case of a missing girl.
- “Birth Defect” (USA, 2014). Private investigator Larry Sportello investigates the disappearance of his former lover.
- “Knives Out” (USA, 2019). Private detective Benoit Blanc is investigating the case of a writer who suddenly died. His involuntary assistant is the deceased’s nurse, who physically cannot stand the lie.
