Carlobianchi and Doriano (Sergio Romano and Pierpaolo Capovilla) can never say no to one last drink. But when they meet the much younger Giulio (Filippo Scotti), they leave their favourite bars and head off on an adventure – which is not to say they also stop drinking. Director Francesco Sossai talks to us about his Cannes Un Certain Regard title The Last One for the Road [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Francesco Sossai
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Cineuropa: There’s something similar to Aki Kaurismäki’s tales here, similar to that cinematic tradition of “men who drink”. There’s a certain melancholy that comes with it.
Francesco Sossai: I’ve spent my life in bars, basically, ever since I was a child. I come from a small town in northern Italy, where the movie is set. It had four roads and ten bars. What interests me is not the pleasure of drinking; it’s not about pleasure at all. Men who drink have a peculiar way of speaking: it’s as if they were in front of an audience all the time. Even if they’re talking to one person, they’re really talking to the whole bar.

These two put on a show for Giulio. It’s actually very sweet and human – there’s fragility in having to constantly act. Usually, they are characters in a stage play, and they know their lines. I wanted to see what happens when that crumbles a bit, when they wake up alone, hungover, and you get a glimpse of who they are for real.

One might wonder why they’re hanging around with that kid – but they need a new listener. They already know all their stories by heart. Giulio looks ahead; they’re looking back. Were you interested in that clash?
In my area, men who drink know a lot about life and the place they come from, but there are more layers to the world. When they merge, something happens. I really like George Lucas’s American Graffiti, which is about the last night before the rest of your life, in a way. Thanks to this meeting, Giulio sees another way of looking at time, which is mainly about telling stories about the past. In ten years’ time, he’ll be an architect in Milan, working in a big office, but he’ll have a story to tell. In return, he opens up the future for them again. He gives them a new story, too.

When we started to write, we realised that we wanted to convey this feeling of wonder when you listen to people. You fill their tales with your imagination. Later, Giulio starts doing it, too: he can picture himself as their lost friend. You mentioned Finland before, and I couldn’t help but imagine Finnish men, sitting in bars. That’s what we do, especially when it’s all fuelled by alcohol.

We expect older characters to share their wisdom with the young. You play with that concept, like in Lost in Translation, and refuse to spell it all out.
It was more about portraying that moment when you feel you’ve come close to understanding something. You’re almost there, and then it’s gone. In the first scene, they are about to reveal a secret, but it’s too loud to hear it. These people are not communicating; they’re trying to communicate. You come so close all the time, but you never reach this final goal.

Or someone forgets all about it! When you were looking for the actors, do you remember what you wanted? They have life written all over their faces.
These guys never came along empty-handed. Sergio is mostly a theatre actor, but he worked so much on the language. He’s not even from my region! Pierpaolo is part of one of the most important Italian rock bands of the last 20 years [One Dimensional Man]. He’s really a rock star, a rock poet. I looked for people who never felt empty, because I never wanted to give away too much information about them. In life, you meet someone in a bar, and you don’t know who they are, either.

You look at Italy just like you look at them – you’re not trying to make it look good. Someone says he wants to see the country “before the Italians destroy it”. Carlobianchi replies: “You’re too late.”
I heard that for real! I was hiking in the mountains and met this German man. That’s exactly what he said. The starting point of it all was a desire to show the contemporary Italian landscape. You get some glimpses of beauty and a lot of destruction. You get everything. You see Venice, but it’s not an ad; it’s an old, derelict city in the middle of the lagoon.

When we used to go out, we didn’t know what was going to happen or who we were going to meet. Were you trying to look at something that is maybe disappearing?
It is slowly disappearing. I guess I wanted to experience another adventurous night by making this film and feel that it’s still possible to get lost like that. You would really travel somewhere during nights like these. You never wanted to go home; you didn’t want it to be over. Because once it is, all you have left is a story.