The Last Days of Capitalism

No matter how many times you see a movie, the prospect of falling in love with a stranger can be an alluring one. We’ve all seen Sharon Stone and Michael Douglas in “Basic Instinct” or Julia Roberts and Richard Gere in “Pretty Woman” and wondered if this really could happen to us. The new movie “The Last Word” starts with a similar premise: two strangers, each protecting their own secrets, are thrown into a whirlwind 72-hour love affair in the penthouse suite of a Las Vegas hotel. After reading the blurb on the back of the DVD case, we were hooked by the idea that our modern, fast-paced world can make it possible for two people to fall in love instantly—and that maybe we could too.

The film opens with a sequence detailing the last days of Iris (Shirley MacLaine), an elderly widow who’s being forced by her son to move into an old folks’ home. Determined to leave him with nothing upon her death, she hires an assistant to help her die quickly and painlessly when she is ready. As Iris begins her search for someone who will take care of her needs (and eventually kill her), Sean (Hugh Grant), a hotshot young writer, arrives at

Ava and Ben are strangers in a penthouse-suite love affair. Ava is there to secretly meet up with a guy she met on the internet and Ben is there to secretly sell his invention. They’re both hiding their true intentions from the other person and from themselves, but it’s obvious to everyone around them because they seem so happy together. The movie really shows that sometimes people find each other when it’s least expected. My favorite part of this movie was at the end when Ava finally tells Ben her real name. It was one of those moments where you’re like, “Ohhh I get why this happened.” It makes sense even though it doesn’t make sense at the same time. I’d give this movie four out of five stars, but more like four out of five stars for the first half and three out of five stars for the second half because it kind of went downhill after 40 minutes into it.