Zack Snyder's long-gestating film, The Last Photograph, has debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) to largely negative reviews. Early critical responses have labeled the latest effort from the director of Justice League as a "torturous slog," citing issues with direction and its political content.
Film programmer Josh Lewis drew a parallel between the film and Sound of Freedom, stating on X that Snyder's quarter-century endeavor felt "functionally indistinguishable" from the controversial film. Critic Nate Adams described The Last Photograph as "borderline embarrassing" and "absolutely abysmal," while TikTok creator DawsOn called it "grotesque, shameless and an utter disgrace." DawsOn further criticized the film for being "Snyder at his most unfiltered, with no studio intervention" and lacking polish, comparing its perceived attempt at shock value to "Daily Wire slop."
The film's official synopsis outlines the story of an ex-DEA operative who travels to South America to find his missing niece and nephew after their diplomat parents are murdered. He teams up with a "washed-up junkie war photographer" who is the only witness to the killers' identities. Their quest forces them to confront past traumas and blurs the lines between reality and surreality.
The Last Photograph stars Stuart Martin as the ex-DEA agent Ethan Black and Fra Fee as the photographer. Snyder has reportedly been developing the project for about twenty years, with concept origins in the mid-2000s. He had previously shelved the film in 2016 before ultimately self-producing it through his company, The Stone Quarry.
This critical reception follows Snyder's recent Rebel Moon duology, which also garnered some of the worst reviews of his career, with Rotten Tomatoes scores of 22% and 16% respectively. Of Snyder's filmography, eight films have received negative Rotten Tomatoes scores, while six have been rated positively. His earlier works, Dawn of the Dead (2004) and Zack Snyder's Justice League, hold scores of 77% and 71% on the aggregator site. Snyder's next directorial project is a reboot of John Carpenter's Escape from New York.