The Last Detail

Encyclopedia : T : TH : THE : The Last Detail

The Last Detail is a 1973 comedy-drama film which tells the story of two United States Navy lifers who are assigned shore patrol duty to transport a young sailor to Portsmouth Naval Prison. On their journey to Portsmouth the character, Meadows, begins to grow on the two sailors and they decide to show him a good time before serving his unjust sentence of eight years.

The film stars Jack Nicholson, Otis Young, Randy Quaid, Clifton James, Carol Kane, Michael Moriarty, and Nancy Allen, and was directed by Hal Ashby. The screenplay was adapted by Robert Towne from a novel by Daryl Ponicsan.

The Last Detail was nominated for three Academy Awards: Best Actor in a Leading Role (Jack Nicholson), Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Randy Quaid), and Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium.

Nicholson reportedly turned down a part in The Sting (eventually filled by Robert Redford) to appear in this film, which was written by his good friend Robert Towne. Both he and Redford were nominated as Best Actor of 1973 at the Academy Awards, but the award went to Jack Lemmon for his work in Save the Tiger.

Movie Flaws

While fairly accurate of Navy life, the beginning of the movie shows Badusky (Nicholson) interacting with the Master-at-Arms, who he refers to as "Chief." The young Yeoman Seaman Apprentice who works in the MAA Office does the same when told to get coffee for the two petty officers. The MAA, however, is wearing the rating badge of a Master Chief Boatswains Mate thus making his proper salutation, "Master Chief."

External links

From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.