[3.8]
It’s certainly amusing watching this on election day 2020, with the insistent pleas that “this is the most important election of our lifetime” echoing with a perverse irony all these 27 years later. When was the last time anyone looked back at the election of 1992 and thought of it as a decisive moment in American history? Maybe the mists of time have obscured Clinton’s rise as nearly inevitable, with a weak and ineffective challenger in incumbent George Bush (who history has also rehabilitated as a good natured, “decent” politician) and kooky third party nom Ross Perot. But, as an interesting “youth movement” companion piece to the more professionally produced THE WAR ROOM, THE LAST PARTY serves as a fascinating peek inside the election cycle as it happens, reacting to the anxieties of a populace who sees both major parties as complicit tools of oppression. What is probably most striking is the use of Robert Downey Jr. as our free spirited guide, stand-in for the youths of America, whose performative Ken Kesey-inspired pranksterism stands at such odds to his modern-day embodiment of elite capitalism (the man played billionaire Tony Stark for over a decade, y’all). There’s a tragic melancholy that hangs over the whole film then, one not inherent in the production but integral to its reception (especially its reception over time) due to the audience’s awareness of what will befall Downey in the years after this film. Even if one were to argue the ‘separate the art from the artist’ line, it certainly doesn’t hold here, as the entire film is built around recognition of personalities and their importance as both individuals and ideas. In 1992, Downey starred in the hit CHAPLIN that would earn him an Oscar nom, and he was certainly a recognizable face to most of the people he interacts with here. He meets up with Oliver Stone (whose JFK had made a splash the year before and certainly amped up the public distrust of the government), Sean Penn (whose own social activism would ramp up and continue far past Downey’s involvement), Bill Clinton (who wisely engages by simply flashing his trademark smile and humoring Downey), Spike Lee, Jerry Brown, and (in eerie foreshadowing of future elections) John Kerry and Arnold Schwarzeneger.
I’m curious how Downey’s goofball antics came off at the time of the pic’s release: were they in line with his public persona then? From a modern eye (and probably to many in 1992), he comes off as desperate for attention, childish in his focus and intellectual curiosity, and as the broey class clown who flirts with activism but grows bored with selflessness. He strips down to his underwear (on several occasions) and poses like a statue in a park, swims in a fountain outside of Wall Street, hops on the floor like a goat (a bizarre recurring ‘skit’ that doesn’t make sense to anyone, including his own father), hangs from a crane in the Democratic convention center, and marches down the street of an AIDS protest in solemn solidarity with a flamboyantly dressed young boy. It’s hard not to cringe at Downey’s self-seriousness, his ‘bold’ take-down of both Democratic and Republican establishment parties signaling his counter-cultural bona-fides, as he mocks the corporate influence that has infested all of politics, before finally settling into a hazy relief at Clinton’s victory. Downey’s father, the famed indie filmmaker, professes his long disinterest and distrust of politics (which is kind of shocking, considering the satirical nature of his films), but notes that this election is the first time he has felt the anxiety that things need to change, and perhaps Clinton is the only one capable of doing that. It’s a recognizable baby-boomer sentiment, expressed in real-time, of that wide swathe of America who tuned-in and dropped-out, confident in their own beliefs and values but numb to the possibilities of organizing for political change. If politics is filthy, just stay home.
burning retina 