Stylish but barely mediocre overall

Did you people see the same film I saw?

Funny, strange, confrontational and subversive, this is one of the most interesting experiences you'll have at the cinema this year.

Ok... Let's be honest. It cannot be the best movie but is quite enjoyable. The movie has the potential to develop a great plot for future movies

An American Neo-Noir thriller on the heels of BASIC INSTINCT (1992), trying to cash in on the splash of erotic charge, but story-wise John Dahl's THE LAST SEDUCTION echoes more of Lawrence Kasdan's sweltering BODY HEAT (1981), meanwhile stoutly posits its focal point in its femme fatale Bridget Gregory (Fiorentino). On the spur of the moment (after being slapped by her doctor-in-training husband Clay), Bridget decamps from NYC with the $700,000 Clay (Pullman) has just obtained by selling stolen pharmaceutical cocaine to two drug dealers, and fetches up in a small town called Beston near Buffalo. Using an alias to lie low when her lawyer is seeking to facilitate a divorce from Clay, Bridget hooks up with a local man Mike (Berg) for sexual gratification and patly rebuffs the latter's knowing-each-other-more overtures, unlike Kathleen Turner using her body to entice William Hurt into her husband-killing plan in BODY HEAT, here Bridget's motive is purely carnal (at least initially), and there is a comical vibe oozing from Mike's dorky frustration of trying to deepen their liaison to little avail, he is her sex toy and he well twigs that she is too smart, too dangerous for his own good, but when the sensual satisfaction is mutually transmitted, a man of Mike's wit just cannot make any wise decision because they all tend to live in the wish-fulfillment that their sexual prowess can eventually tame the lioness both physically and mentally. But Mike is not a lion, he is just an ordinary Joe with average sexual allure and common codes of moral behavior. On the other hand, Bridget is not promiscuous in spite of her horny predisposition, Mike has remained as her only bedfellow under the circumstances, but when she needs someone to do away with Clay, who hires a private detective and is bent on having his doles back, she must wheedle a law-abiding Mike into a murderous vigilante, and this transitional arc is the meat of this erotic indie, and who would expect it is the deepest shame of homosexuality becomes the ultimate fillip in Bridget's cunning scheme. The film is soft-core in sight but ingrained feminist on the strength of Steve Baranick's sometimes incoherent (if Bridget simples leaves and starts anew somewhere, never resorts to a divorce and never contacts Clay again, there will be a very different story to be told) but piquantly subversive script albeit its male angle, and Linda Fiorentino shall be hallowed as one of the most iconic femmes fatales in the film-noir history, her lethal sex appeal is never feel contrived, or rehearsed to flaunt or conquer, but strangely spontaneous, she can talk about risqué stuff as if she is narrating a poem (in the scene where she manipulates the black private eye played by Bill Nunn) and never degrades her part into hokum, Bridget is lack of empathy, predatory, sly but also whip-smart, unsentimental and intuitively self-empowering, she is not a woman you want to be entangled with, but it doesn't hurt to put her on a pedestal for being uncompromisingly true to herself. Peter Berg's Mike is on a lesser note in terms of extraordinariness, an exceptional decision for him to convert to a career of directing blockbusters (HANCOCK 2008, BATTLESHIP 2012) and Mark Wahlberg vehicles. Bill Pullman is another humdinger here, poles away from his usual good-guy image, he is hilariously wacky and uncouthly sympathetic in this city-trash-versus-small-town-simpleton throw-down, for once, justice may not be justly served, but we all prefer this way!

The Last Seduction is knee deep in the kind of seedy, neo-noir atmosphere you expect from these movies made in the 80s and 90s: House of Games, Basic Instinct, L.A. Confidential, Blood Simple, you know the type. The characters talk like they're either in the big city, or they're pretending to be. Their dialogue drips with suggestion and double meaning, not merely to turn the wheels of their devious schemes but also to key the audience into their motives. Linda Fiorentino is never less than what the plot needs her to be. Even as she is treated to her familiar dose of domestic abuse you can hear the churning and scheming in her mind - ladies and gentlemen, your femme fatale. And yet the performance is alluring all the same, despite dozens of previous stories telling us all how this one ends. Bridget Gregory, or Wendy Kroy, doesn't have the same blonde bombshell figure that you might expect after seeing Kathleen Turner in Body Heat, but in her mind that just keeps unwanted attention at bay. She doesn't need the pining of the small-town schmucks, she needs the guy in the middle, the straight-laced, overly-polite insurance worker who will go the extra mile for her even after having been rejected half a dozen times. Only after this initial test of his will (and his physical capabilities) does she give a little away. Peter Berg seems like a sap at first glance, the type of person to take an insult openly like a slap in the face and slip in a little self-depreciation for good measure. Here's a gorgeous woman offering one night stands upfront with a no commitment deal, but he mopes and mopes; he wants to talk a little in between all the sex, and eventually move up into the 'I love you' territory. Berg's Mike is so stilted and robotic next to Fiorentino throwing herself at him that it's almost as if he was an alien studying how to perform a human. But then the final twist is revealed, and suddenly everything makes sense. Mike has had his sense of masculinity shattered, and flees to his home town to re-piece it together. He can't afford to fall at the feet of whichever local hottie says hi to him at the bar; he's too guarded for that. Every minute of Mike's character is him over-correcting for his past mistakes, cautiously tip-toeing around the latest gal in town. But like any good noir, eventually he will fall in. And who wouldn't? Watch Fiorentino use her shoulder-length hair like a silky, black curtain, constantly swishing it back and forth as a power move. She doesn't just sit down, she sprawls and displays her entire body over furniture pieces, leaning way, way back, and men everywhere are transfixed. And her vocal delivery has just a tiny touch of huskiness to it - is it any wonder that Mike follows her around like a puppy?Bill Pullman as Clay, the wronged man, sticks out like the third wheel to this odd couple. He may put everything into that deadbeat grimace of his, but this is the same guy who played the president of the United States (and by extension, the planet Earth). Try as he might, he can't seem to fully summon all his loathing for his ex-wife, and so their phone calls are part menace, and full on seduction. She hasn't just hit him back, she's kicked him square in the groin and the wallet, and yet here he is trying to crawl back anyway. You might argue that there is no depth to this femme fatale, and you'd be right. She wants money and sex, and is willing to forgo the latter for the former. The men she stalks are the same. It's either one or the other, and even poor Mike has that thinly veiled desperation about him when he cracks. In return, he attempts to desperately re-assert his masculinity and falls right into her trap. Forget the convenience of the phone call trace now being swift; what matters is how he has played right into her hands, and revealed his meekness to be nothing but a temporary facade. Yet the great noirs crafted entire lives in mere glances and touches, made longing and memory a torturous existence. Dahl uses his entire runtime as foreplay, and although at the end I was thrilled, the twist didn't tell me anything I didn't already know about dames like Bridget. In Out of the Past, Robert Mitchum has to fend off advances from a past lover, who threatens to pull him back into a world he once abandoned. At the end of the movie, we don't agree with his choice, but we understand why he chooses it - he never really left in the first place. True, you don't expect complex character introspection from these types of trashy neo-noirs, but at least throw in something fresh. The genre hit a snag in this period, by thinking that urban ugliness was the only setting that these archetypes belonged to. So the photography is all shadows and murkiness, with some neon signage here and there. But Fiorentino could bring a man to his knees in open daylight.

Not among the top list. But, the movie is really a worth watch. There are so many films about deadly and dangerous women. This one is one among them.Bridget Gregory has an amazing talent to write backwards. She makes her husband to do drug deal, steals the money and run away. She finds a job in another town under a fake name. She meets a young man, who gives her regular company.A well made movie. Definitely worth watch. If you are a fan of Gone Girl, this movie is also a must watch.#KiduMovie

A devious sexpot steals her husband's drug money and hides out in a small town where she meets the perfect dupe for her next scheme.The rumor is that this film was intended to be a "skin flick" but the people involved wanted to make something a little bit better. What they ended up with was a thriller not unlike "Basic Instinct" and "Fatal Attraction". In a world full of stupid men, a crafty woman can control her destiny.How well this film is known, I do not know. I wasn't aware of it. But enough people have rated it on IMDb that it must have been big at the time. Heck, there are rumors that it almost got an Oscar nomination. (Lots of "rumors" with this film... not sure what to believe.)