Main Cast: Robert De Niro, Tony Curtis, Robert Mitchum, Jeanne Moreau, Jack Nicholson
Release Year: 1976
Country: US
Run Time: 122 minutes
MPAA Rating: PG
Plot
Elia Kazan directed this curiously constipated film adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's unfinished final novel, about Monroe Starr, a brilliant and efficient studio executive (based upon Fitzgerald's experiences with MGM wunderkind Irving Thalberg). Robert De Niro plays Monroe Starr in a cool and detached manner, and as Kazan pans around the Hollywood Dream Factory of the 1930s, Starr juggles several productions, deals with nervous actors and recalcitrant directors, stays afloat in the Hollywood corporate battlefields, and secretly carries on a love affair with an even cooler and more detached English girl, Kathleen Moore (Ingrid Boulting). ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
Review
The Last Tycoon, released in 1976, is one of the last vestiges of old Hollywood merging with new Hollywood. Adapted from the unfinished novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald, it is an effective tribute to a time when the movie industry was in its infancy. Robert DeNiro stars as Monroe Stahr, a thinly veiled depiction of film pioneer Irving Thalberg, who is burdened by his overwhelming position as a studio production head, by the loss of his movie star wife, and by his weak heart. While DeNiro's portrayal is the centerpiece of the film, there are several other elements involved which lend an extra aura of prestige. Directed by Elia Kazan, the film is technically competent, but, as it is based on a work which its original author left incomplete, the ending is a bit forced and contrived. To lend additional sparkle, there are appearances by a multitude of stars such as Tony Curtis, Robert Mitchum, Ray Milland, and Theresa Russell who vie for screen time on the periphery of the main plot line involving Stahr's encounter and subsequent infatuation with an extra, played by Ingrid Boulting, who is his dead wife's twin. Kazan captures the spirit of the time and place well, but the pacing is slow and sometimes confusing. While The Last Tycoon represents Elia Kazan's last directorial effort, it is also notable for featuring the only joint screen appearance to date of Robert DeNiro and Jack Nicholson. ~ Dan Friedman, All Movie Guide
Jack T. Collis - Art Director, Richard Bruno - Costume Designer, Anna Hill Johnstone - Costume Designer, Anthea Sylbert - Costume Designer, Thalia Phillips - Costume Designer, Daniel McCauley - First Assistant Director, Elia Kazan - Director, Richard Marks - Editor, Ronald Roose - Editor, Maurice Jarre - Composer (Music Score), Gary D. Liddiard - Makeup, Gene Callahan - Production Designer, Victor J. Kemper - Cinematographer, Sam Spiegel - Producer, Jerry Wunderlich - Set Designer, William Smith - Set Designer, Henry Millar - Special Effects, Larry Jost - Sound/Sound Designer, Dick Vorisek - Sound/Sound Designer, Harold Pinter - Screenwriter, F. Scott Fitzgerald - Book Author
The film was the second collaboration between Kazan and Spiegel who worked closely together to make On the Waterfront. Spiegel was once awarded the Irving Thalberg Memorial Award and Fitzgerald based the novel's protagonist, Monroe Stahr, on producer Irving Thalberg.
The film did not receive the critical acclaim that much of Elia Kazan's earlier films received, but was F. Scott Fitzgerald's last, unfinished novel as well as the last film Kazan directed.
Apart From That ·Applicant ·The Black and White ·Dialogue for Three · "God's District" ·Interview ·Last to Go ·The New World Order ·Night ·Precisely ·Press Conference ·Request Stop, Special Offer ·That's All ·That's Your Trouble ·Trouble in the Works
