86
Metascore
16 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 100Time OutKeith UhlichTime OutKeith UhlichThere’s a once-in-a-lifetime feeling to the trio’s every interaction—not only as characters but as performers—that makes the film’s casually tragic climax that much more devastating.
- 90The New York TimesVincent CanbyThe New York TimesVincent CanbyThe Last Detail is one superbly funny, uproariously intelligent performance, plus two others that are very, very good, which are so effectively surrounded by profound bleakness that it seems to be a new kind of anti-comedy. You'll laugh at it, not through your tears but with a sense of creeping misery.
- 90The New YorkerPauline KaelThe New YorkerPauline KaelThe film is distinguished by the fine performances of Nicholson and Quaid, and by remarkably well-orchestrated profane dialogue. It's often very funny. It's programmed to wrench your heart, though-it's about the blasted lives of people who discover their humanity too late.
- It's a "road" story in the best disciplined sense. Quaid is nothing short of remarkable as the boy who blunders into relationships and finally comes to intimations of himself as individual and as person.
- 88Slant MagazineChuck BowenSlant MagazineChuck BowenThe Last Detail is so perfectly tailored to the star that it could’ve been mapped out from a Pythagorean theorem.
- 80TV Guide MagazineTV Guide MagazineThe Last Detail is a gritty look at the military life and the people who are attracted to it. It is dark in its message and gray to the eye. Locations are all washed out as though there were a thin membrane of filth spread across everything except the leads, who pop out colorfully like three strawberries in a bowl of Cream of Wheat.
- 80Chicago ReaderChicago ReaderThough it takes place in winter, it’s an ideal summer movie—breezy, charming, and coolly antiauthoritarian. Last Detail is, of course, an antiauthoritarian fable, and the film’s tolerance for oddballs and down-and-outers ends up feeding its contempt for the Navy’s punitive rules.
- 80Chicago ReaderChicago ReaderA tough-talking, sparely directed effort by Hal Ashby, with an immaculate performance by Jack Nicholson as the arrogant and salty (but feeling) sailor who tries to stay in charge of the odyssey, and almost doesn't.