If anything, Last Call is a cinematic dumping ground for former A-list movie stars of varying generations, the emphasis on faded star power presumably a front for a weak f-bomb-laden script, unimaginative direction, and a hackneyed prodigal-son-returns-home storyline that seems to be a perennial favorite with indie directors these days.
The Prodigal One in this case is successful real estate developer Mick (played by former bad-boy star of obnoxious noughties series Entourage) who returns to his working-class Darby Heights neighborhood outside Philly only temporarily for his mom’s funeral but ends up feeling obligated to stay and try and help save his family’s business, a seedy Irish pub threatened by looming gentrification.
Of course, as soon as the opening credits begin to flash, we get the familiar bluegrassy acoustic slide guitar incidental music working its sensitive magic: from this, we know right away that under the film’s rough exterior there will be a contrived warm and sentimental underbelly. And sure, we meet lots of roguish, rough-and-tumble characters who carouse around in Mick’s periphery: all are Darby “lifers” who Mick not-so-secretly looks down on not least because they live in a state of boozy perpetual adolescence.
Rounding out the sundry actors cast for the local ne’er-do-wells are, among others, former 90s mainstay Jamie Kennedy, here playing a sleazy ponytailed bar bouncer; former Scorsese starlet Cathy Moriarty playing a vaguely Eastern European grandma; and none other than Bruce Dern, playing (surprise) a vulgarity-spewing old crank, a role these days he seems all too willing to be typecast in.
While the old neighborhood begins to suck Mick down into its bleary alcoholic depths, he also sees a business opportunity with a local crooked businessman who wants to bring a casino to the neighborhood, which could be a cash cow for Mick. So he goes door to door in his old stomping grounds, trying to get signatures for the casino's planning permission. (“It will bring jobs,” he tells everyone, except that no one seems interested in jobs around here).
The problem with casting Piven in the lead role of Mick is that it’s a role that requires emotional nuance and the ability to effectively feign an occasional nonabrasive personality trait. This is a film that certainly means well, but its attempts at having a “heart” lack depth and too often lapse into crude King of Queens-style working-class stereotypes. Not Recommended.