LAST SEEN ALIVE : Tuesday 24th May 2022

I saw the American mystery action thriller 'LAST SEEN ALIVE' at my local multiplex this week, and this M Rated film is Directed by Brian Goodman in this third feature film making outing following 'What Doesn't Kill You' in 2008 and 'Black Butterfly' in 2017. He has been busy in the interim however, racking up, so far, sixty-one screen acting credits in feature films and TV series. The film is set for a release in the US on 3rd June, and was released here in Australia on 19th May and has generated mixed or average Reviews along the way. 

The film opens up with Will Spann (Gerard Butler, who also Co-Produces here) and his wife Lisa (Jaimie Alexander) travelling by car from Manchester, in New Hampshire to the rural community of Emmerson. The atmosphere in the car between the two is a little tense, as Will is driving his wife to her parents home, where she intends to take a two week break from him, in order to clear her head and gain a little perspective on her life going forward. Fifteen minutes outside of Emmerson, and Will announces that he needs to pull over to refuel his car, lest Lisa wants to get out and push, to which she politely declines. It is 9:30am. At the petrol station, Will gets out and begins to refuel, while Lisa goes inside the shop, visits the toilet and buys a bottle of water. Lisa walks out of the shop, and as she is approaching the forecourt she is motioned by a man, walks in his direction, just as a big rig truck obscures Will's view. When the truck moves on there is no sign of Lisa. 

Will waits beside his car and getting impatient goes inside the shop, looking for his wife, but she is nowhere to be seen. He asks the assistant at the pay desk but he says that he has not seen anyone fitting her description. Will goes outside, by now becoming increasingly agitated. He attempts to call Lisa's mobile phone several times but the line diverts to voicemail each time. He drives around the entire petrol station precinct but there is no sign. He goes back inside and asks the assistant again, getting the same response as before. After twenty minutes he calls 911 and gets through to the local Police Department, and one Sergeant Patterson (Russell Hornsby) who tells him to stay put and he'll either send a squad car there or will come out himself. 

While waiting, Will decides to drive the fifteen minutes to Lisa's parents home in the hope that she may have chosen to walk there. Needless to say Lisa is not there and her parents are somewhat suspicious to say the least that Will is being truthful with them, that perhaps the pair had a fight, and that he is covering something up. Will leaves and heads back to the petrol station. By now it is 10:30am and Sergeant Patterson pulls up. Will tells him that he has been to her parents home, much to Patterson's chagrin. They go inside the shop and speak with Oscar, the pay desk assistant, who reiterates that he has no recollection of seeing Lisa. Patterson asks to see the CCTV footage but Oscar says that it hasn't been working for some weeks now. After asking a few more questions Patterson leaves and Will thanks him for his time and the assistance. Walking back outside Will observes that a security camera pointing directly at the doors of the shop is flicking red, indicating that it is working. He goes back inside and confronts Oscar. A brawl ensues in which Will gains the upper hand very quickly over Oscar, and rips out the hard drive which has the recorded CCTV footage, and promptly delivers it to the Police Department into the hands of Patterson. They look at the footage and notice the unknown man motioning towards Lisa just as the truck passes blocking out the view. Will takes a photo of the unknown man. 

Patterson than asks Will to step into an interview room to answer a few questions. Patterson asks what line he is in, to which Will replies that he is in Real Estate Development, with his own business. Patterson asks is there have been any disgruntled employees, is their marriage steady, to they fight, have either one of them ever had an affair, to which Will responds that Lisa did, about six months ago, but he never has, and what was their purpose for coming to Emmerson. Free to leave, Will goes back to Lisa's parents home and shows her Mum the photo of the unknown man who is believed to have abducted Lisa. They recognise the man as Knuckles who has been doing some odd jobs around the parents home and who is an old school friend of Lisa's, and she also recognises the car into which Lisa was bundled, saying that she recalls seeing it about five miles down the road in a rural community. 

Will drives out to the location where Knuckles allegedly is, and breaks into the caravan where Knuckles is hurriedly packing up. The pair get into a fist fight, with Will gaining the upper hand again and beating Knuckes senseless. He binds Knuckles hand up with gaffa tape but not before getting the man to speak where Lisa is. He says that she is with a Frank, and gives Will his location. Will then bundles Knuckles into the back of his car. Driving down the freeway, his speed is clocked at 86MPH by a Highway Patrol car who pulls Will over. After checking his drivers license and can registration documents the Officer motions for Will to get out of the car. Feeling uneasy, he is asked to open the boot, and which point Will does a runner and makes a quick exit into the nearby woodland. Now on foot and traipsing through the undergrowth, Will's SatNav tells him that he is two miles away from his destination. He continues on foot and eventually comes to a road which leads him to Frank's covert crystal meth manufacturing plant. By now its about 3:30pm in the afternoon. 

Will snoops around the compound trying to remain out of sight and inconspicuous. Eventually, he makes his way into the makeshift crystal meth lab where he sees Frank (David Kallaway) talking to his henchman Larry (Alphonso A'Qen-Aten Jackson). They are stood besides a shipping container which Will surmises that Lisa is locked in. Pointing his gun (which he took from Knuckles when he over powered him) at Frank and Larry, he orders them to open the doors of the container. Larry does so, while Frank backs away. In peering inside Larry attacks Will, but sustains a fatal shot to the gut. Trapped inside the container Frank now opens fire on Will, who manages to make a run for it and so begins a game of cat and mouse between the two, until Franks shoots at Will who randomly returns fire in the general direction of Frank . . . and then silence. Will discovers Franks dead body and leaves the lab, not noticing that a small fire has broken out from a tipped over bunsen burner. 

Meanwhile Patterson has Knuckles handcuffed in the back of a Police patrol car, and it is 5:00pm. Patterson coerces Knuckles into telling him where Lisa is and even if she is still alive. Knuckles says that she is dead and buried behind Franks house. Patterson, immediately gets himself over to the compound. Will, in the meantime, has ventured back outside and is greeted by Oscar pointing a gun at Will, who in turn is pointing his gun at Oscar. The pair agree to lower their weapons and discuss where Lisa is. Oscar says that he will take Will to her for US$20K, but he wants the money now, as he throws Lisa's mobile phone down on the ground at Will's feet. At that the meth lab explodes in a huge ball of flame incinerating Oscar in the process and sending Will flying backwards. 

In the aftermath, Patterson arrives on the scene as Oscar's charred remains are zipped up in a body bag. There is still no sign of Lisa. Patterson orders Will to rest up, while he goes around to the back of Frank's house. There he comes across a hole in the ground covered up with sheets of corrugated iron. He reluctantly lifts the sheets to reveal the grave empty. Will, sitting on a bench seat, hears a banging noise and goes to investigate the sound coming from a shack. Inside Lisa is bound and gagged but very much alive. He picks up his wife, cradling her in his arms as she sobs uncontrollably. 

In the closing scene, Lisa is at her parents home, with Will outside slumped over the bonnet of his car. Patterson drives up and the pair both exchange their gratitude to one another. Patterson says that it looks as though gunfire was exchanged between the two dead bodies recovered from the burned out lab, but replies to himself 'those that live by the sword . . . '. Will says thanks again, as Patterson leaves. Lisa comes out and she and Will embrace as they walk inside the house just as it starts to rain. 

The trailer for 'Last Seen Alive', tells us that Will Spann 'is a simple man, no special skills, no Secret Service, no Special Forces' - well you coulda fooled me because this protagonist is pretty useful with his fists, a gun and a crowbar and is able to snoop around a busy drug compound in broad daylight undetected! That said, there are some moments of genuine tension in this film that help elevate it from other similar movies of the genre, the humour is particularly thin on the ground, the dialogue is exactly what you would expect, and the action takes a back seat to the emotion, anxiety, and the dilemma that Will finds himself in, but when the action does come, it's brutal. Gerard Butler plays it convincingly enough, in his usual tough guy persona, but Jaimie Alexander undercooks her role as she fails to show any depth of humanity or modicum of compassion for a man she still has feelings for, until the closing scene. The Director Brian Goodman, has done a good job at making a relatively inexpensive movie look greater than the sum of its parts, although some elements are a bit too obvious including two shots that home in on barrels of 'flammable' liquid that you just know what is coming next . . . and yes, you guessed it, that CGI rendered explosion as the meth lab erupts in a ball of flame. All of that said, this a reasonable entry into the genre, but it's not great, and at a running time of ninety-five minutes it doesn't overstay its welcome. 

'Last Seen Alive' merits three claps of the Odeon Online clapperboard from a possible five claps. 

-Steve, at Odeon Online-