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By Paul Tatara
CNN Reviewer
(CNN) -- Now that patriotism has become the altogether necessary opiate of our rattled masses, "The Last Castle" will probably be a big, fat star-spangled hit.
Robert Redford stars as Gen. Irwin, a heroic Vietnam War veteran who's saddled with a 10-year sentence in a Stateside military prison for violating the very code that shaped him as a man. There's enough flag-waving to give you tendinitis, and Jerry Goldsmith's score is loaded with mournful French horns.
Director Rod Lurie (who, obviously, couldn't have predicted the events of September 11 during filming) all but dares you to tsk-tsk the picture and seem un-American in front of your neighbors.
This is the kind of movie that announces its high-minded moralizing with salute-worthy capital letters. It's a story about Men who want to live with Honor and Dignity, because America and its glorious Armed Forces are the standards by which Freedom is judged around the world. That's certainly acceptable, if you counterweight it with your own political inclinations.
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But there's a very big catch to "The Last Castle": it starts out Pretty Good, then it turns Silly, and finishes up Really Dumb.
The screenplay, by David Scarpa and Graham Yost, is so blatant and conveniently plotted that it seems to have received a polish from a propaganda minister.
James Gandolfini plays Col. Winter, the warden of that nasty prison. For roughly the first hour, the story is really just a militia-happy variation on the popular Paul Newman vehicle "Cool Hand Luke." (If you haven't seen that one, wait about 10 minutes and they'll be showing it again on TBS.)
Winter, a fastidious, prissy type who continually watches the prison courtyard through the window of his air-conditioned office, is The Man, i.e. the overseer who manipulates and crushes the prisoners at will.
Although the inmates are all former members of the military, Winter has methodically extracted any military tendencies from their psyches. They're brutally disciplined if they salute each other, they can't refer to their former rank, and basic camaraderie is a punishable offense.
Then Redford shows up. Gen. Irwin is known to everyone at the prison as a first-class hero and war strategist. He even did time in a P.O.W. camp with the father of a doubting-Thomas inmate (Mark Ruffalo, who constantly seems like he just woke up).
Colonel Winter, a collector of military memorabilia, greatly admires Gen. Irwin, even though he's now locking him in a cell. But Irwin is a principled, brilliant motivator who doesn't like what Winter is doing to the uniform. (Or, more precisely, The Uniform.) It's not long before these two hotshots are battling for the hearts and minds of the inmates.
This part of the story plays fairly well, even though the battle is spelled out in reinforced concrete, almost literally: It becomes obvious that Irwin is swaying the men to his side when they tear down a poorly-constructed rock wall that Winter was forcing them to build, only to perfectly re-assemble it through the power of precision teamwork.
The men also devise slang terms to replace their former ranks, and they run their hands through their hair rather than saluting each other. That'll show 'em.
Obviously, this will be leading to a massive showdown, in which the inmates attempt to take over the asylum. However, unlike other prison movies, no one is looking to escape. They just want Winter to be revealed as the creep he is, because soldiers should be treated with the respect soldiers deserve.
Unfortunately, the script has to cheat whatever reality the situation holds by refusing to reveal what 99 percent of those soldiers did to end up in the stockade. After all, you can't have Robert Redford plotting an uprising of rapists and officer stabbers. And tooting on a French horn lends little dignity to a psychopath.
The eventual uprising is absolutely ridiculous, not that the majority of people will care. For such a strict disciplinarian, Winter doesn't keep much of an eye on his charges. It takes about five perfectly executed "yeah, right" situations for the action to start. The kicker is when the men roll out a fully functional, 20-foot tall catapult. That's what you call clandestine activity.
Redford, for his part, gives a sturdy, old-fashioned movie-star performance, full of his trademark wry, one-eyed squints. He's also willing to look his age, but suddenly doesn't when he takes off his shirt during a torture session. (If you recall Clint Eastwood's withered tree-bark flesh in "The Bridges of Madison County," you'll be pleasantly surprised.)
This performance won't make anyone forget "The Sting" or even "The Natural." But it's a pleasure to see one of our sharpest matinee idols carrying the mantle with poise into his later years. Good for him, and good for an otherwise absurdist movie.
"The Last Castle" contains profanity, punching, people catching on fire, people being hosed down, people being clubbed, and people being shot. But the food in the mess hall looks pretty good.
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