By Todd Garbarini

In the mid 1980’s, I caught ABC-TV’s premiere broadcast of Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining (1980) and it changed me forever. I became a huge fan of both Stanley Kubrick’s and Stephen King’s work, as well as classical music. Despite the protestations of many a film reviewer regarding the casting of Jack Nicholson, I greatly admired his performance in the film, and eagerly sought out all of his films that I could find on home video and television at the time. Among them was a film that I had not heard of before, the story about two Navy lifers transporting a convict to the “brig”, a military prison, for having stolen $40.00 out of the Polio contribution box (the Commanding Officer’s wife’s favorite charity – oops!!). Hal Ashby’s The Last Detail (1973), which opened in New York on Sunday, February 10, 1974 (having premiered in L.A. in December of 1973) , contains my favorite film performance by Jack Nicholson, which is saying a lot considering that his turn as R.P. McMurphy in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975) is the role that most critics think of when they discuss his work. Here he plays Billy "Badass" Buddusky, a U.S. petty officer who, along with Richard "Mule" Mulhall (the late Otis Young), is tasked with escorting a sailor, Larry Meadows (Randy Quaid), from their home base in Norfolk, VA to Portsmouth Naval Prison up in Maine. On the surface, this looks like a fairly routine affair as Buddusky and Mulhall go through the motions of taking Meadows by train to his final destination. Initially by-the-book and aloof, they begin to feel sympathetic towards the nebbish Meadows following a shoplifting episode. He’s obviously a kleptomaniac and, even though he’s only 18, probably feels as though his life is over. Along the way, they start to think of the things that Meadows will miss out on – his first sexual experience, having his first beer, and getting into all sorts of fun trouble. Buddusky takes on the role of the leader, and he sets out to show Meadows a good time. They break into laughter following Buddusky’s outburst at a bartender (the language his uses in this scene could very well have been a first for the time) and Meadows looks like a kid rang someone’s doorbell, ran off and has gotten away with it. He’s obviously enjoying himself with his newfound “friends”. They get beer on their own and get drunk, then spend the night in a hotel room and laugh to their heart’s content.

As time progresses, Buddusky and Mulhall cannot help but take a liking to Meadows, and eventually start to feel sorry for him, feeling that he got a raw deal. They take time to seek out his mother during a stop in Philadelphia (they don’t find her), and then they watch him attempt to ice skate in Rockefeller Center in New York and fight with Marines at Penn Station (which looks completely different than it does today). In Boston, they take Meadows to a whorehouse for his first sexual experience (Carol Kane plays the prostitute). Michael Chapman, the cinematographer who shot the movie, plays the taxi driver who gives the boys a ride (Mr. Chapman would go on to shoot Taxi Driver for Martin Scorsese in the summer of 1975, and actually appears as a cab fare in that film). They also sit it on a session with Nichiren Shoshu Buddhists and Meadows attempts to put into use the chant that he is taught in order to obtain good fortune. The late Luana Anders makes an appearance in this scene, as does the late Gilda Radner; they both died of cancer in 1996 and 1989 respectively. Another party they end up at features a very young Nancy Allen, who is told by Jack Nicholson in a very funny speech about why he loves his uniform. Even director Ashby shows up: he can be seen sitting at the bar in the dart-throwing sequence, sporting glasses and his trademark white beard. By the end of the film, we know that inevitably they must follow their orders, and it’s painful to see Meadows incur Buddusky’s wrath following a failed attempt to escape. The ending is poignant, but a far cry from the tremendous downer that ends the novel of the same name by Daryl Ponicsan upon which the film is based. Thankfully, the film is a tad more upbeat.