Let's be realistic.

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

I didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

THE LAST BULLET – 1995This excellent Australian television film is about the Borneo Campaign of 1945. This was the last major Allied campaign in the South West Pacific during the Second World War.The film is set during July 1945 just before the end of the Pacific conflict. The Australian Army has defeated the main Japanese forces, and are now engaged in mopping up operations. The war has come down to small unit actions in the dense Borneo jungles.A new replacement, Jason Donovan, has joined one of the platoons out searching for the remaining Japanese. At the same time, a group of 40 or so Japanese are about to launch a Banzi attack on an Australian position further inside the jungle. The attack is repelled with only two Japanese surviving.The two make their way deeper into the dense forest to hide. They come upon an old abandoned bunker. They find some old rice to chow down on. This beats the bamboo sprouts and bugs they have been living on. By this time in the war the Japanese merchant fleet had been wiped out. No supplies were getting through to bases on the Pacific outposts.Donovan's patrol is making a sweep through the forest and come up on the two Japanese, Kôji Tamaki and Kazuhiro Muroyama. Tamaki is a sniper with a scoped rifle. The two Japanese soldiers manage to ambush the Australian patrol. They wipe out the patrol except for Donovan. Muroyama is also killed in the battle.Now the two enemies spend the next two days and nights trying to kill the other. Both have sniping rifles and both are wounded in the fire exchange. There is a real game of cat and mouse here as each tries to finish the other. Grenades and rounds are exchanged till both are down to their last bullet. What happens now? This one is a down and dirty war film, showing just how quick and bloody death can come.For a film made on a television budget, this one is better than you would expect. It was well worth the 90 minutes spent watching.

I started watching this film with low expectations but what a GREAT movie this turns out to be!! It reminded me of the top class movie Enemy at the Gates (the duel between Vasili and the German sniper)although "Last Bullet" of course has a lot smaller budget!! It started out quite slow but when the sniper duel unfolds the tension is breathtaking! The great thing about this movie is that you feel for both sides of the fight, the American but the Japanese soldier too! The characters are decently developed and the climax of the film worked great for me!! I can recommend this film to EVERYONE that enjoys war movies and it's a shame that this movie is known by such a small group of people!!

This movie is just excellent. It's a little war movie that no one has ever heard about and that's a real shame. At a quick glance it's not very interesting: an Australian made for TV movie starring Jason Donovan. And it's 90 minutes long (for me that's the definition of TV crap, those 90 minutes). But all is not what it seems. It's the story of an Australian and a Japanese soldier (both the last survivors of their units) that square of against each other in the jungles of Burma in the ending days of WWII. But it's not the action that's the allure of this movie. We get to know these guys with flashbacks to their lives before the war. What's their motivation, their background? They are not one dimensional and we get to know them and learn that neither of them is a bad guy (not even the Japanese who is always portrayed as bad guys in war movies). They are where they are for good reasons and during this movie it's impossible to take sides against either one. They are both good guys and you cry for them and what happens to them.A great movie about what happens to men during war.

--Feb 2003--My favorite WWII movie. Period. There are many contenders for the WWII title and this one takes it without much dispute. I keep it next to Lawrence of Arabia.While I am a fan of war movies (along side a couple of other select genres) nothing makes me hate war more than this movie. It is perfect.Somewhat reminiscent of Hell in the Pacific with its mano-a-mano style.--Oct 2013 edit--Looking back at this film years later it is, admittedly, hard to still call it may favorite WWII movie. Band of Brothers/The Pacific, Flags of Our Fathers/Letters from Iwo Jima, and maybe some others are all very good. So what is it about this film that grabs me (or used to grab me)?The replay value is not all that great. This is not a film that you could probably sell your friends on at a movie party. I gave the film 10 stars perhaps mostly because I judge a film against its own budget and not against other films (and this is a low-budget film). Yet, the production quality is only pretty good, the acting is only pretty good ... everything seems to point to maybe 8 stars at best and not 10. Most of the great films I watch get an 8 or 9 with 10 going to only the truly landmark or innovative films. How is this one of those?What it comes down to is this: I remember how moved I was when I first saw it. For that, it somehow earned two extra stars. Thus, while during replay (or some other critical viewing) it may be hard to see this value, isn't the emotional response while watching something the first time the true value of a dramatic film?The stereotyped, ruthless, WWII Japanese warrior is well known in film. Perhaps fairly--perhaps unfairly. I have spent a bit of time researching Japanese culture and their sense of honor. I 'believe' I get the true message of a film such as Grave of the Fireflies (another great WWII movie--certainly the most depressing one) better than many Americans. The Last Bullet took me someplace wonderful in my understanding of Japanese honor: a place where it is impossible to judge which of the two main characters acted more bravely in a difficult situation. Surprising (a lot like how When the Last Sword is Drawn was another surprising film about Japanese honor). The difference between shame and honor is not always apparent--even in Japan it seems. Showing us the human struggle between shame and honor is what makes this film great.