The Last Match Blu-ray Review

Cauldron Films

Blu-ray Release: February 11, 2025 (following a 2023 limited edition)

Video: 1.66:1/1080p/Color

Audio: English DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Mono

Subtitles: English SDH

Run Time: 94:03

Director: Fabrizio De Angelis

What do you do when your daughter is framed for drug smuggling during a Caribbean vacation while being held in jail by a sadistic warden (Henry Silva)? If you are football star Cliff Gaylor (Oliver Tobias), you call an audible and do whatever you can to get her out! But when the American Consulate (Charles Napier) doesn't want to be involved and the local attorney (Martin Balsam) only wants you to grease his palm with no guarantees, your only choice is to take matters into your own hands. Before he can even call the next play, his coach (Ernest Borgnine) and the rest of the football team are on a plane packed with weapons and money aimed to free his daughter or die trying! (From Cauldron’s official synopsis)

By the early ‘90s, the ever-dependable Italian exploitation machine was drying up as the international home video era had put the mockbuster market back in the hands of American producers. But the Italians weren’t to be counted out just yet. There were still Hollywood hits worth ripping off and the highest minded of high concept screenwriters knew the answer to the nation’s problems: ripping off multiple, seemingly incompatible films at once. Enter Gianfranco Clerici and Vincenzo Mannino, who were handed a script by American B-movie actor/A-movie stunt coordinator Gary Kent (purchased from a Swedish filmmaking company) about a soccer team staging a rescue mission, which they transformed into an unholy hybrid of everything from Alan Parker’s Midnight Express (1978) to George P. Cosmatos’ Rambo: First Blood Part II (1985) and Robert Aldrich’s The Longest Yard (1974), entitled The Last Match (Italian: L'ultima meta, 1991).

The film was directed by Fabrizio De Angelis, the producer of Lucio Fulci’s Zombie (Italian: Zombie 2, 1979) and The Beyond (Italian: ...E tu vivrai nel terrore! L'aldilà, 1981), among others, Marino Girolami’s Zombi Holocaust (aka: Dr. Butcher, M.D., 1980), and Enzo G. Castilari’s 1990: The Bronx Warriors (Italian: 1990: I guerrieri del Bronx, 1982). By the late ‘80s, he was acting as director, producer, and writer of cheap action quickies, including all six films in the Karate Warrior (Italian: Il ragazzo dal kimono d'oro) franchise. De Angelis wasn’t particularly talented behind the camera, but he also wasn’t a total hack on the level of Bruno Mattei or Claudio Fragasso, which leaves him in the unenviable space between simply competent and so-bad-it’s-good.

The Last Match’s unfinished quality puts it closer to the so-bad-it’s-good side of the equation. I assume that Kent’s script was largely scrapped, that Clerici & Mannino (both frequent collaborators with Fulci, Castellari, and Ruggero Deodato) supplied a nebulous outline and that the English speaking cast supplied a lot of their own dialogue, as evident by the long pauses and stilted discussions. Some cast members, like Martin Balsam, are obviously scanning offscreen cue cards. The final extended climax, where the football team infiltrates the prison, armed to the teeth and in full uniform, is quite fun (if not choppy), but the bulk of the time is spent awkwardly filling space between set-pieces in a categorically Italians-pretending-to-be-Americans-type manner. It’s an acquired taste of weird filmmaking that might bore the Troll 2 (1990) crowd, while rewarding B-action fans in search of deep cut oddities.

The most extraordinary thing about The Last Match is probably its sheer quantity of aging Hollywood character actors. Since the early ‘60s and rise of pepla and spaghetti westerns, down-on-their-luck guys with interesting faces and recognizable resumes had been finding second life careers in Italy, but we’re usually talking one or two Americans per cast, tops. The exceptions were Hollywood co-productions, like Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time in the West (Italian: C'era una volta il West, 1968), not low-budget video fodder, like this. Henry Silva almost doesn’t count, as he’d been regularly starring in Italian movies, going back to Carlo Lizzani’s The Hills Run Red (Italian: Un Fiume di Dollari, 1966), but combining him with Academy Award winners Ernest Borgnine and the aforementioned Balsam, and actual Rambo: First Blood Part II alum Charles Napier, is a remarkable, near Expendables-level feat of stunt casting.

Other recognizable faces include go-to thug-type Jeff Moldovan – who is meant to be a vaguely Afro-Latino islander type (the film was technically shot in the Dominican Republic), but speaks without a hint of Spanish accent – soap opera star turned Bar Rescue mixologist Rob Floyd, Buffalo Bills quarterback Jim Kelly, fresh off the first of four consecutive (losing) Super Bowl appearances, and a host of other NFL players, including Jim Kiick, Jim Jensen, Mike Kozlowski, and Elmer Bailey.

Video

IMDb lists Vidmark and Star Maker as US video distributors, but I can't find photographic evidence of either company actually producing a VHS tape. There are definitely European VHS and DVD releases, however, this disc represents the first official Blu-ray availability in any region. Cauldron initially released their 1080p, 1.66:1 4K restoration of the original camera negative as a limited edition via their website and Diabolik DVD back in 2023 and this standard edition is missing the slipcase, poster, and booklet.

Most of the shortcomings here are probably due to the film quality, not the transfer itself. Specifically, there are some really dark sequences: sometimes for mood, sometimes just because the filmmakers messed up/ran out of money. These scenes can appear a tinge muddy. Otherwise, the 4K scan is sharp and film-like with nice textures and few obvious compression artifacts. The palette is pretty bland, but the colors are consistent and well-supported by black levels that appear strong without gobbling up too much important detail (outside of those really dark scenes).

Audio

The Last Match is presented in its original mono English and uncompressed DTS-HD Master Audio. Obviously, there would have also been an Italian dub at some point, but the main cast is made up of native English speakers, speaking in English. I assume that the filmmakers were still largely shooting without recording on-set sound at this point in the early ‘90s and there’s loads of obvious ADR, but there are also some scenes with a convincingly natural vocal quality, all of which leads to a lot of inconsistency and really airy ambiance. Again, this isn’t Cauldron’s problem, they’ve done a nice job cleaning up the audio without making it sound too sharp or digital-y. Composer Guglielmo Arcieri, who only has this one lone IMDb credit, supplies an outdated, very loud, and cheaply produced, yet also undeniably likeable synth score. I’m especially fond of the nonsensical drum and karate chop SFX rhythm he created for the car/foot chase.

Extras

• Commentary with Michael A. Martinez – The critic, effects artist, director and Italian exploitation enthusiast explores the wider history of Italian exploitation cycles, the industry’s collapse during the late ‘80s/early ‘90s, the collapse of the independent home video market, De Angelis’ work, and the careers of other members of the cast & crew.

• Blown Away (16:14, HD) – Special effects artist Roberto Ricci looks back on this and the other films he worked on during the era, behind-the-scenes antics, and shooting in Santo Domingo.

• American Actors in a Declining Italian Cinema (29:03, HD) – Mike Malloy, the director of Eurocrime! The Italian Cop and Gangster Films That Ruled the '70s (2012), compares the careers of American stars who worked in Italy, focusing on the longevity of those careers, and which actors stuck around as the industry was crashing.

• Understanding the Cobra (17:38, HD) – Italian film expert and DVD/Blu-ray extras director/producer Eugenio Ercolani discusses television’s part in the downfall of theatrical Italian film distribution, the creative implosion of the exploitation market, and De Angelis’ cutthroat approach to film distribution.

• Photo gallery

• Theatrical trailer

The images on this page are taken from the Blu-ray and sized for the page. Larger versions can be viewed by clicking the images. Note that there will be some JPG compression.