The Last Child (film)

Last updated
The Last Child
GenreDrama
Science Fiction
Thriller
Written by Peter S. Fischer
Directed by John Llewellyn Moxey
Starring Michael Cole
Van Heflin
Harry Guardino
Janet Margolin
Music by Laurence Rosenthal
Country of originUnited States
Original languageEnglish
Production
Executive producer Aaron Spelling
ProducerWilliam Allyn
Production location Paramount Studios
CinematographyArchie R. Dalzell
EditorArt Seid
Running time73 minutes
Production company Aaron Spelling Productions
Original release
Network ABC
ReleaseOctober 5, 1971 (1971-10-05)

The Last Child is a 1971 American TV film. It was the last film of Van Heflin. [1]

Contents

Plot

In the future, overpopulation has meant that, in the United States, people are allowed to have only one child and are denied all medical care (save for palliative care) when they turn 65.

Reception

Reviewing the film in the present day for the SF Weekly, David-Elijah Nahmod wrote:

When The Last Child was first broadcast on ABC in October 1971, star Michael Cole was enjoying a brief brush with stardom on the hit cop show The Mod Squad . The actor proved his acting chops with this intense drama set in the “not too distant future”.

Many issues come up during the film’s 71 minute running time — The Last Child remains potent and topical even today.

The film's primary question is a woman's right to autonomy over her body. Women today are once again being forced to fight for the right to decide for themselves whether or not to practice birth control or whether or not to have an abortion. The Last Child underscores many of those battles by reversing the question: what if a woman was forced to have an abortion against her will? At what point does a woman get to choose for herself without interference from others? At what point is the government overstepping its boundaries and interfering in a person's personal life?

Cole and Janet Margolin star as Alan and Karen, a couple still mourning the loss of their baby the year before. Karen is pregnant again, but in the grossly overpopulated futuristic society they live in, only one child per couple is allowed.

The fact that Karen’s baby died is of little consequence to the population control police, headed by a sociopathic Ed Asner. Asner was, at the time, achieving TV immortality for his delightful portrayal of the grumpy-if-kindhearted Mr. Grant on The Mary Tyler Moore Show . He offers a deliciously over-the-top, against-type performance as The Last Child’s villain. [2]

Cast

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mary Tyler Moore</span> American actress and television producer (1936–2017)

Mary Tyler Moore was an American actress, producer, and social advocate. She is best known for her roles on The Dick Van Dyke Show (1961–1966) and especially The Mary Tyler Moore Show (1970–1977), which "helped define a new vision of American womanhood" and "appealed to an audience facing the new trials of modern-day existence". Moore won seven Primetime Emmy Awards and three Golden Globe Awards. She was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in Ordinary People. Moore had major supporting roles in the musical film Thoroughly Modern Millie and the dark comedy film Flirting with Disaster. Moore also received praise for her performance in the television film Heartsounds. Moore was an advocate for animal rights, vegetarianism and diabetes awareness and research.

<i>The Mary Tyler Moore Show</i> American television sitcom (1970–1977)

The Mary Tyler Moore Show is an American television sitcom created by James L. Brooks and Allan Burns and starring actress Mary Tyler Moore. The show originally aired on CBS from September 19, 1970, to March 19, 1977. Moore portrayed Mary Richards, an unmarried, independent woman focused on her career as associate producer of a news show at the fictional local station WJM in Minneapolis. Ed Asner co-starred as Mary's boss Lou Grant, alongside Gavin MacLeod, Ted Knight, Georgia Engel, Betty White, Valerie Harper as friend and neighbor Rhoda Morgenstern, and Cloris Leachman as friend and landlady Phyllis Lindstrom.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lou Grant</span> Fictional character from The Mary Tyler Moore Show

Lou Grant is a fictional character played by Ed Asner in two television series produced by MTM Enterprises for CBS. The first was The Mary Tyler Moore Show (1970–1977), a half-hour light-hearted situation comedy in which the character was the news director at fictional television station WJM-TV in Minneapolis. A spinoff series, entitled Lou Grant (1977–1982), was an hour-long serious dramatic series that frequently engaged in social commentary, featuring the same character as city editor of the fictional Los Angeles Tribune. Although spin-offs are common on American television, Lou Grant remains one of a very few characters played by the same actor to have a leading role on both a popular comedy and a popular dramatic series.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ed Asner</span> American actor (1929–2021)

Eddie Asner was an American actor. He is most notable for portraying Lou Grant during the 1970s and early 1980s, on both The Mary Tyler Moore Show and its spin-off series Lou Grant, making him one of the few television actors to portray the same character in both a comedy and a drama.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Erica Kane</span> Soap opera character

Erica Kane is a fictional character from the American ABC Daytime soap opera All My Children. The character was portrayed by actress Susan Lucci from her debut on January 16, 1970, until the last broadcast television episode on September 23, 2011. Lucci was expected to guest star on Prospect Park's continuation of All My Children in 2013, but the appearance never came to fruition due to the show's second cancellation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Van Heflin</span> American actor (1908–1971)

Emmett Evan "Van" Heflin Jr. was an American theatre, radio, and film actor. He played mostly character parts over the course of his film career, but during the 1940s had a string of roles as a leading man. Heflin won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in Johnny Eager (1942). He also had memorable roles in westerns such as Shane (1953), 3:10 to Yuma (1957), and Gunman's Walk (1958), and as a bomb man in the disaster film Airport (1970), his last screen role.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rosalind Cash</span> American actress (1938–1995)

Rosalind Cash was an American actress. Her best-known film role is in the 1971 science-fiction film The Omega Man. Cash also had another notable role as Mary Mae Ward in ABC's General Hospital, a role she portrayed from 1994 until her death in 1995.

<i>Lou Grant</i> (TV series) American drama television series

Lou Grant is an American drama television series starring Ed Asner in the title role as a newspaper editor that aired on CBS from September 20, 1977, to September 13, 1982. The third spin-off of the American sitcom The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Lou Grant was created by James L. Brooks, Allan Burns, and Gene Reynolds.

<i>David and Lisa</i> 1962 American drama television film directed by Frank Perry

David and Lisa is a 1962 American drama film directed by Frank Perry. It is based on the second story in the two-in-one novellas Jordi/Lisa and David by Theodore Isaac Rubin; the screenplay, written by Frank Perry's wife Eleanor Perry, tells the story of a bright young man suffering from a mental illness which, among other symptoms, has instilled in him a fear of being touched. This lands him in a residential treatment center, where he meets Lisa, a similarly ill young woman who displays a split personality.

<i>Village of the Damned</i> (1995 film) 1995 American film

Village of the Damned is a 1995 American science fiction-horror film directed by John Carpenter, written by David Himmelstein, and starring Christopher Reeve, Linda Kozlowski, Kirstie Alley, Michael Paré, Mark Hamill, and Meredith Salenger. It is a remake of the 1960 film of the same name, itself based on the 1957 novel The Midwich Cuckoos by John Wyndham. The 1995 version is set in Northern California, whereas the book and original film are both set in the United Kingdom. The 1995 film was marketed with the tagline, "Beware the Children".

<i>Act of Violence</i> 1948 film by Fred Zinnemann

Act of Violence is a 1949 American film noir directed by Fred Zinnemann and starring Van Heflin, Robert Ryan, Janet Leigh, Mary Astor and Phyllis Thaxter. It was produced by Hollywood studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Adapted for the screen by Robert L. Richards from a story by Collier Young, the film confronts the ethics of war and was one of the first to address the problems of World War II veterans.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stuart Margolin</span> American actor and director (1940–2022)

Stuart Margolin was an American film, theater, and television actor and director who won two Emmy Awards for playing Evelyn "Angel" Martin on the 1970s television series The Rockford Files. In 1973, he appeared on Gunsmoke as an outlaw. The next year he played an important role in Death Wish, giving Charles Bronson his first gun. In 1981, Margolin portrayed the character of Philo Sandeen in a recurring role as a Native American tracker in the 1981–1982 television series, Bret Maverick.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Janet Margolin</span> American actress (1943–1993)

Janet Natalie Margolin was an American theater, television and film actress.

A Defense of Abortion is a moral philosophy essay by Judith Jarvis Thomson first published in Philosophy & Public Affairs in 1971. Granting for the sake of argument that the fetus has a right to life, Thomson uses thought experiments to argue that the right to life does not include, entail, or imply the right to use someone else's body to survive and that induced abortion is therefore morally permissible. Thomson's argument has critics on both sides of the abortion debate, but it continues to receive defense. Despite criticism, "A Defense of Abortion" remains highly influential.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Michael Cole (actor)</span> American actor (born 1940)

Michael Cole is an American actor. He is best known for his role as Pete Cochran on the television crime drama The Mod Squad (1968–1973). He is the last surviving member of the original cast.

<i>Just Between Friends</i> 1986 film by Allan Burns

Just Between Friends is a 1986 American drama film about two women whose friendship is tested by tragedy. The film was written, produced and directed by Allan Burns, and it stars Mary Tyler Moore, Christine Lahti, Ted Danson and Sam Waterston.

<i>A Tigers Tale</i> 1987 film by Peter Douglas

A Tiger's Tale is a 1987 American comedy-drama film starring Ann-Margret and C. Thomas Howell, written and directed by Peter Douglas, based on the novel Love and Other Natural Disasters by Allen Hannay III.

Rachel Louise Bradley is a fictional character portrayed by Helen Baxendale in the British comedy-drama television series Cold Feet. Rachel is introduced in the pilot episode (1997), where she begins a relationship with Adam Williams. Their relationship has highs and lows throughout the series; Rachel reveals a secret husband in the first series (1998) and has an abortion in the second (1999), which supposedly prevents her from conceiving a child in the future. She and Adam marry in the third series (2000) and are surprised to discover that she is pregnant in the fourth (2001). They both begin raising their child in the fifth series (2003), but Rachel's life is cut short when she is killed in a car crash.

<i>Its Alive III: Island of the Alive</i> 1987 American film

It's Alive III: Island of the Alive is a 1987 American science fiction horror film written and directed by Larry Cohen. It is the sequel to the 1978 film It Lives Again. The film stars Michael Moriarty, Karen Black, Laurene Landon, James Dixon, Gerrit Graham, Macdonald Carey and Neal Israel. The film was released by Warner Bros. in May 1987.

References

  1. Vision of Life in Year 1992 Smith, Cecil. Los Angeles Times 05 Oct 1971: e16.
  2. Nahmod, David-Elijah (26 August 2015). "The Golden Age of TV Movies: The Last Child (1971)". SFWeekly.com. SF Weekly . Retrieved 26 August 2015.