How Sean Penn really feels about the worst movie of his career: “Everyone is entitled to their response”
Sean Penn is one interesting cat. He’s undoubtedly a very good actor and has the awards and reviews to prove it. Unfortunately, it’s very hard to like the man.
He comes across as extremely pious, embodying a ‘holier than thou’ attitude when it comes to his objectively impressive humanitarian work. His personal life also leaves a lot to be desired, with the actor even spending some time in jail after he struck an extra on the set of one of his films.
When it comes to Penn’s actual output, that too is very up and down. Take a look at the stuff he’s directed, for example. In 2007, he made the widely beloved Into the Wild, a heartfelt takedown of individualism and the wider American culture. On the other side of the coin, there’s his 2016 film The Last Face, which, bluntly speaking, went down like a turd in a punch bowl.
Starring Penn’s then-girlfriend, Charlize Theron, as a doctor working in a war-torn part of West Africa. She meets a Spanish physician named Miguel (Javier Bardem) who shares her goal of bringing treatment to those most in need. Sounds like it has potential, right? Unfortunately, that’s all it had.
Critics had an absolute field day tearing The Last Face to shreds. Among claims of White saviorism and modern imperialism, the film also faced criticism on the grounds of a poor story, dreadful performances from its leads, and the baffling decision to place the wealthy Westerners at the centre of a narrative ostensibly about Africa. The film reportedly debuted to boos at Cannes, a rarity for the clap-happy event. Penn was forced to go on the defensive, which is precisely what he did.
“I finished the film, so it’s not a discussion that I can be of any value to,” he told reporters at the festival (via The Hollywood Reporter). “I stand behind the film as it is, and certainly everyone is entitled to their response.”
Penn went on to elaborate by claiming that, despite its negative reception, the film stood for something important. “I think it’s important to entertain if entertainment is not synonymous with Donald Trump’s behavior,” he claimed. “What the hunger is now is pulling us away from our humanity a lot of the time. But to find beauty in things today is the way to fix it. But what we are calling beauty today is largely a perversion of it. And that’s lamentable.”
Penn has never missed an opportunity to take a swipe at the current US President, even warning once that he could ‘destroy the world’. As for the rest of his statement, he is correct in stating that art shouldn’t shy away from presenting stories of tragedy. It’s the way in which he did it – or rather didn’t do it – that rubbed people up the wrong way. He had an opportunity to highlight a part of the world that rarely gets this sort of coverage, but instead, he chose to make the movie all about the two good-looking English speakers and their quest for ‘true love’.
The Last Face is a complete disaster and critics were absolutely correct in their assessment of it. Still, you have to admire Penn for standing up for it… actually, no you don’t. He should have known better.
