Zack Snyder’s The Last Photograph draws harsh reviews

Zack Snyder’s long-gestating film The Last Photograph premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival, where early reactions described the war thriller as an exhausting misfire burdened by heavy-handed direction and controversial politics.

One social-media reaction called it “the worst movie of Zack Snyder’s career”, while other early responses were similarly severe. Film programmer and Sleazoids podcast host Josh Lewis wrote that the 25-year project combines a war-journalist mercenary story with influences from Apocalypse Now and The Searchers, yet ultimately resembles Sound of Freedom.

Critic Nate Adams labelled the film “borderline embarrassing” and “absolutely abysmal”. Entertainment TikToker DawsOn described it as grotesque, shameless and dependent on shock value, arguing that its lack of studio intervention was a major weakness. The film was also criticised as an unsuccessful attempt to make Snyder’s version of Civil War.

As criticism spread, some Snyder supporters defended the director online, including users who had not seen the film and challenged those who had reviewed it negatively.

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What is The Last Photograph about?

The film follows Ethan Black, an ex-DEA operative who travels back to the mountains of South America after his diplomat sister and her partner are brutally murdered. Their children have disappeared, and Ethan recruits a troubled, drug-dependent war photographer who is the only person to have seen the killers.

The search takes the pair deep into an unfamiliar landscape as they pursue the missing children and the truth. Along the way, both men are forced to confront their pasts, while the journey increasingly blurs the boundary between reality and the surreal.

An ex-DEA operative must return to the mountains of South America in an effort to find his missing niece and nephew, following the brutal murders of their diplomat parents. Enlisting the help of a washed-up junkie war photographer, the only person to have seen the face of the killers, he sets out, determined to find the children and the truth, but soon learns he must also face the ghosts of his past. Their journey into the unknown takes them further and further away from civilisation, bringing into question everything they believe, while slowly eroding the distinction between real and surreal.

Stuart Martin plays Ethan Black, while Fra Fee portrays the troubled photographer. Snyder developed the idea intermittently for the better part of two decades. He first conceived it in the mid-2000s, shelved it in 2016 and later self-produced it through his company, The Stone Quarry.

Where does it sit in Snyder’s filmography?

The director’s two Rebel Moon films received the lowest Rotten Tomatoes scores of his career, at 22% and 16%. His strongest scores include 2004’s Dawn of the Dead at 77% and Zack Snyder’s Justice League at 71%. Across his filmography, six films have received positive scores, while eight have been rated rotten.

Snyder’s next announced project is a reboot of John Carpenter’s Escape from New York. Readers comparing cinematic spectacle with interactive entertainment can also explore RETROCADE’s arcade machine buying guide, browse arcade machines or consider a compact bartop arcade.