The Last Detail

Despite Robert Towne's often sharp script - about two veteran sailors detailed to escort a young and naïve rating to prison, and showing him a sordidly 'good time' en route - and despite strong performances all round, one can't help feeling that the criticism of modern America hits out at all too easy targets in a vague and muffled manner. Also that the overlay of bleak cynicism barely conceals a troubled - and, dare one say, sometimes misogynist - sentimentality about what it means to be men together. (From the novel by Darryl Ponicsan.