Last Night (2010) Review

The film spans over 24 hours when married couple Joanna and Michael are apart for the night. He is away on a business trip with the female colleague which caused an argument with Jo the night before. A surprise is in store for Jo when an old flame turns up in New York.

The timescale in the film is so important to help show just how much can happen in a full day. The couple argued but then made up. But would temptation be too high that they would both end up cheating. They both have the opportunities to cheat in the time they are apart, but what will they do. We are shown them deal with this moral situation and are never show what either will do until the very end.

I found Jo’s situation with Alex (her old lover from when she was in Paris) more interesting and complex. We are slowly given the background into what happened between them, understanding how much she was in love with him. How she still thinks about him when things are not going right. But can she say goodbye to the other man she has loved after all of these years, or will she have one last time with him?

Michael’s situation seems to be the typical situation men find themselves in (those in the movies at least). He worked with Laura and she was pretty much offering herself to him for quite a while before we have a look in at this night. Again we are unsure throughout whether Michael will actually take that extra step and cheat on his wife.

I am not usually a fan of Keira Knightley but I actually did enjoy her performance in this film, I felt like I could relate to her character very well and understand the pain she felt along with the dilemma she was faced with. Eva Mendes really does seem to be typecast in the role of trying to steal the husband away for an affair.

The film also shows us how fragile a marriage can be, and how easy you could cheat. If you really wanted to of course. As I have managed to get through this review without revealing what they both end up doing it makes it quite difficult to talk about the ending. The ending is left for the audience to decide what happens next, I think this was a very good approach as it had everyone in my screening wondering why it had finished so suddenly. I think that made me like this film a little more than I had done throughout.

Probably not the film you would be rushing out to see, but I would place it somewhere between Revolutionary Road and Closer, yet softer versions of them both mixed together.