Starring Rob Lowe, Demi Moore, James Belushi, Elizabeth Perkins, George DiCenzo, Michael Alldredge, Robin Thomas, Donna Gibbons, Megan Mullally
Directed by Edward Zwick
Expectations: Moderate.
About Last Night kicks immediately into its frank dialogue about sexual escapades and it can be a little jarring. Maybe it’s just me, but I expect a movie to wine and dine me a bit before we’re talking about fucking in air force flak jackets and setting the room on fire both figuratively and literally. But once you get accustomed to About Last Night‘s scandalous nature, it is a pretty entertaining relationship movie.
The film centers around two pairs of friends who meet at a company softball game. Demi Moore can’t stop looking at Rob Lowe, and vice versa, so they quickly strike up a relationship based on their mutual, intense attraction. Their friends don’t take it so well, though, and the film develops into something a little more complex than your average rom-com.
But to just call About Last Night a straight drama is also a bit wrong, and it ignores two major factors contributing to the production of this movie. First, it’s the ’80s, so that means montages. Being a martial arts fan, I’m partial to training montages, but I’m an equal opportunity montage fan so I’ll take “moving in” montages too. Putting up a new coat hook might not sound very exciting fare for a movie, but with Sheena Easton belting out an ’80s pop song on the soundtrack, you’ll be surprised just how fun it can be. Secondly, this is a Brat Pack movie so About Last Night is a lot trashier and entertainment minded than a true straight romantic drama, like say A Room With a View, would be.
Demi Moore has a line mid-way through the movie where she mentions how the whole living together thing just doesn’t feel like she thought it would. She mentions how it’s nothing like her parents, and how it instead feels like “a couple of kids playing house.” I found this line especially touching, as earlier in the film when they were amidst the moving in montage, I found myself thinking back to the early days of living with my girlfriend. We’ve been together for about eight years, and I remember having the same feeling as Demi Moore when I first moved in. Like two kids playing house. This makes me wonder if many other people also feel this way, unsure of how to proceed or compromise themselves because the reality is something decidedly different than the fantasy.
If you’re looking for a good date night movie and you both like ’80s movies, then About Last Night is a good one. It might be too vulgar for some, as the Belushi character is the ultimate chauvinistic asshole and all the characters throw out frank, profanity-laden dialogue regularly (it is based on a Mamet play, after all), but most people will find something to like here. And for those that care, the film is being remade with a mostly black cast, including Kevin Hart in the Belushi role. I think Kevin Hart could really tear that shit up, and I think I’ll like the character more with Hart in there. Definitely one to watch for, romance fans.