McShane as her husband and the wonderful Dyan Cannon and Richard Benjamin. Herbert Ross directs what is a complex story with a deft touch right up to the denoument - which is brilliant and has a great pay-off line.The dvd version has a commentary with Cannon, Benjamin and Welch. However, Welch sounds as though she recorded alone and really doesn't offer much insight into the whole project except for comments about her wardrobe and the fact that she didn't understand the plot, but that was ok as she says because her character had little understanding of what was going on either.

clues....right before my eyes. Never guessed the killer either and I am a mystery buff and usually can. The cast is great.There are so many funny and bitchy lines in this movie they come from every direction. My favorite line: James Mason a TV commercial director filming a dog food commercial talking to his wife on phone "I am sorry dear but I must hang up a cast member is peeing on my leg." And he doesn't mean one of the pooches! Beautifully filmed and an all around A++++ film.

only trouble with "The Last of Sheila" is that the first-half, involving a hilarious personality game, is so clever, we want more of it; the murder-mystery second-volley is an acting showpiece, but not quite as engaging. Still, these characters are a wonderfully tainted, self-absorbed lot, and Cannon's mini-breakdown after someone almost offs her is a wild bit of hysterical showing off. I also admired Welch's scene at midnight on the top deck, talking about stealing a coat she's very seductive and charming, though she continues to whisper her dialogue throughout the film and fails to make the strong impression each of her co-stars do . The character conflicts and the reasoning behind who-does-what-to-whom doesn't bear a great deal of scrutiny and even after several viewings, I'm still not clear on that business regarding the cabin keys ; however, the picture is extremely entertaining, a verbally exciting match-of-wits by a group of Hollywood hopefuls and burn-outs. ***1/2 from ****

this to death.

experienced Hollywood writers, right? The opposite is true, in fact. "The Last of Sheila" was written by two puzzle-fanatics, active in the film industry although in entirely different fields, that never wrote any other stories before or after this one-hit-wonder! This may not sound too extraordinary to most people, but personally I'm very intrigued by this type of random coincidences. Anthony Perkins Mr. Norman Bates of "Psycho" and Stephen Sondheim a composer and songwriter apparently share a nerdish passion for real-life scavenger hunts/puzzle games and combined their ingenious knowledge to think up this whodunit mystery that has more twists and turns than a mountain road in the French Alps! And – moreover – the red herrings all make full sense and the details of the denouement although incredibly far-fetched are all waterproof in the end, which is quite an impressive accomplishment for two men whose day-to-day job isn't writing scripts! Congratulations Mr. Perkins and Mr. Sondheim; your achievements give an additional dimension of brilliance to an already terrific film! "The Last of Sheila" will appeal mostly to fans of the better Agatha Christie adaptations, like "And then there were none" and "Murder on the Orient Express". What starts as a festive reunion among elite Hollywood colleagues quickly escalates into a hostile and confronting search for the culprit of an unsolved crime. The rich, eccentric and slightly obnoxious Clinton Green stellar role for James Coburn lost his wife Sheila in a hit-and-run accident. Exactly one year later, he invites six people who were present at the party on the night of Sheila's death for a vacation on the luxury yacht that carries the same name as his deceased wife. He thought up a seemingly innocent game for which he hands out little cards to all of his guests. The cards playfully accuse their owners of having committed a certain crime, and the purpose of the game is the participants to the crime on their cards. Some of the guests are righteously suspicious and discover that the crimes aren't just randomly chosen, but actual crimes that the guests desperately attempt to keep secret. Clinton's main goal of the trip is obviously to unmask his wife's killer, but a lot of unforeseen incidents will take place before the revelation of his/her identity. The rules of the games and the subsequent discussions between the characters are quite high-level and often difficult to follow, but most of all truly fascinating to behold. Especially during the last half hour, I was literally glued to the screen and regularly re-watched the most vital dialogs 2 or even 3 times in order to be sure I understood everything. It's always great when a movie sucks you like this. Of course, a film like this also owes a lot of its impact to the cast. In addition to James Coburn, the rest of the all-star cast gives away splendid performances as well. According to the trivia section, Raquel Welch behaved like an annoying diva and made herself quite unpopular amongst her co-players, but hey, she's Raquel Welch and she looks astounding! Hammer-horror nymph Yvonne Romain "Curse of the Werewolf", "Night Creatures" briefly appears at the beginning of the film as the titular Sheila. Another nifty detail in the script is that one of the main characters refers to Hammer horror later in the film, when they're solving a riddle inside an abandoned monastery. I could go on and on about the inventiveness of the script and the particular attention that director Herbert Ross pays to minor details, but you get the idea. "The Last of Sheila" comes with my highest possible recommendation.

know the same stuff; how did Clinton find out? Sheila, probably." The game winner gets top billing in Clinton's forthcoming movie: "The Last Of Sheila".The script's underlying premise is ingenious, and the story is quite well executed. The plot has more twists and turns than a corkscrew. Every scene is important in some way. The identity of the killer is not at all easy to discern. Indeed, my guess was wrong.The film has an ensemble cast, and they all give convincing performances. I especially liked James Mason and Dyan Cannon. Color cinematography is topnotch, and includes some difficult camera shots of and on a luxury yacht. My only complaint about this film is its relative lack of suspense. I could have wished for more spooky chills. For a murder mystery, the tone is just a tad too playful.Inadequate suspense aside, this is a terrific movie that will appeal to mystery lovers especially. It's got some classy characters and dialogue, great visuals, fine performances, and a riveting plot.

dialog spat out by a magnificent James Coburn: "We don't want this topic to degenerate to the discussion phase." "Sheila" is a murder mystery that begins with Sheila herself getting killed in a hit-and-run. That happens before the opening credits. Then her marvelously malevolent widower, a movie producer James Coburn , sets out to nail the killer. He invites six Hollywood friends for a Mediterranean cruise on his yacht. Once on board, he involves them in an elaborate game to play as an amusement. They don't know it, but the real point of the game is diabolical: to find out who killed Sheila, because Coburn knows that one of them ran her down. It happened during a party that they all attended, and they all had motives. Indeed, the point of the movie, in a way, is that everyone in heartless Hollywood has a motive to kill everyone else. Upon arrival at the yacht, he hands each of the six a card on which is written "You are a…" followed by a personal secret, something "not too light": Shoplifter, Homosexual, Ex-Convict, Informer, Little Child Molester, and Alcoholic. S,H,E,I,L,A— though the players don't notice that because they haven't yet seen each other's cards .The game involves everyone finding out the others' assigned secrets, and first up is the Shoplifter. Each player is given the same clue– a key with "Sterling 18K" stamped on it– to find out who has the Shoplifter card. With that clue they are ferried to shore to find the answer. Without giving too much away, I can say that the Shoplifter card was assigned to James Mason, but one of the women characters was actually arrested some years earlier for shoplifting a fur coat. She therefore realizes that something more than a harmless game is afoot. The card she holds, Homosexual, is obviously someone else's real secret.Before it's all over, three characters are dead, courtesy of two others, and there are two additional murder attempts, perpetrated by separate players with separate motives.The screenplay is altogether unique, co-authored as it is by two very famous men, neither of whom wrote any other screenplays, alone or together: Stephen Sondheim and Anthony Perkins. The plot is entirely consistent with the friends' fondness for elaborate game-playing. Their dialog is brisk, witty, and delightfully vicious. Except for the predictably wooden work of Richard Benjamin, the performances are sparkling. Dyan Cannon grabs her juicy part with both hands, while Raquel Welch delivers her juicy parts in a bikini. Ultimately, though, the movie belongs to the two Jameses, Coburn and Mason. Mason's character– who shares many traits with Humbert Humbert, including the most obvious– is an aging director who ultimately unravels the mystery.Saying more means revealing more, and Sheila's tangled web is best woven before a viewer's eyes without advance knowledge. The only thing I will add is that the film was shot on location on French Riviera. The principal murder takes place in a wonderfully gloomy old site which, I suspect, is the fortified monastery of Ile Saint-Honorat, near Cannes. Gamesmanship is evident even in that choice: a suitable spot for an unholy picture about Hollywood.

makes up for it by wearing a bikini and the clues are all there if you're smart enough. Watch it.