The Last One for the Road · reception & legacy
2025 · Francesco Sossai
How The Last One for the Road has been received, argued over, and remembered.
The arc
It slipped into Cannes 2025's Un Certain Regard as a modest Italian charmer — then a year later swept the 2026 David di Donatello with eight wins including Best Film and Best Director, turning a small pub-crawl movie into Italy's film of the year.
What's debated
The friendly fight it starts: is this just a lovely, feather-light hangout movie, or a sly state-of-the-nation portrait hiding inside one — and does it earn the Il Sorpasso comparisons every review reaches for?
Its footprint
Its whole premise — two aging Veneto barflies forever chasing 'one last drink' — is the hook everyone quotes, and it's made the region's spritz-and-ombra bar ritual weirdly cinematic shorthand.
Where it stands
A fast canon climber: the rare festival sleeper that became a genuine audience favourite and instant reference point for the new Italian hangout movie.
Named by the director
Influences Francesco Sossai has publicly named — the director's own word, distinct from the inferred lines of influence.
- Il Sorpasso (1962) — Sossai called it the film that most inspired him, saying he wanted a counter-portrait — Risi's economic-miracle road movie remapped onto Italy after the 2008 crisis.
- Dino Risi — Sossai cited Risi's commedia all'italiana as the storytelling form he set out to update, using comedy to make an ironic portrait of the nation.