The Complete Venice FF Collection: Poor Things and more
Dear Last Thing I Sawfolk,
This time I’ve been in Venice. But also in Toronto. But first let’s talk about Venice: the movies were good! Quite good. Poor Things, The Beast—actors and directors going for broke. Spectacular. I recorded a few podcasts, and well, here we are. I even left in the sound of a boat horn!
All that and more is below. Thank you to the supporters of The Last Thing I Saw!
Yours, &c.,
Nic
THE PODCAST
Venice 2023 #1 with Glenn Kenny: Ferrari, Dogman, Hollywoodgate
Venice 2023 #2 with Guy Lodge: Poor Things, Menus-Plaisirs Les Troisgros, City of Wind, Explanation for Everything
Venice 2023 #3 with Jonathan Romney: Maestro, The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar, The Palace, El Conde, The Promised Land
Venice 2023 #4 with Jordan Cronk: Aggro Dr1ft, The Beast, Evil Does Not Exist, Gasoline Rainbow
Venice 2023 #5 with Jessica Kiang: Priscilla, Green Border, Hit Man, Coup de Chance
Venice 2023 #6 with Glenn Kenny: The Killer, The Caine Mutiny Court Martial, Portrait of Gina, Making Of, Andrei Rublev restored
Jordan Cronk writes for multiple publications and is programmer/founder of Acropolis Cinema in Los Angeles.
Glenn Kenny is a regular contributor to The New York Times and RogerEbert.com, and also writes on his own site Some Came Running. He is the author of Made Men: The Story of Goodfellas.
Jessica Kiang is a Berlin-based freelance film critic with bylines in Variety, Sight & Sound, and The New York Times. She is the international programmer of the Belfast Film Festival.
Guy Lodge writes for Variety and the Observer, where he has a weekly column. He also co-edits and writes for Film of the Week.
Jonathan Romney writes for Screen Daily, Sight & Sound, and The Observer, and teaches at the UK’s National Film and Television School.
Episodes of The Last Thing I Saw are also available at other podcast places such as Spotify.
RECENT WORK
For Artforum, I wrote a report on the Venice film festival, which was an embarrassment of riches. Read all about it!
For the Financial Times, I finally wrote about Past Lives, which involved a wonderful interview with the writer-director, Celine Song.
And for Sight & Sound, I wrote a few reviews out of Venice: David Fincher’s The Killer, starring Michael Fassbender; Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s Evil Does Not Exist: and the new Harmony Korine whatzit, Aggro Dr1ft.
THIS CRITIC’S PICKS
Trust (Criterion)
Fear Is the Key (Criterion) I watched this last year in a terrible copy. Looky here
Rotting in the Sun (MUBI)
Hangover Square (Criterion)
Friday (HBO MAX)
Donnie Darko (Criterion)
THE END
Here I may end with a song.
ABOUT ME
Welcome to The Last Thing I Saw! I’m your host, Nicolas Rapold.
Besides hosting the podcast, I’m a writer and an editor. My features, interviews, festival reports, and reviews are published in The New York Times, Screen Slate, Sight & Sound, Filmmaker, Air Mail, The Los Angeles Times, and W Magazine. (Plus dearly departed publications such as The Village Voice, Stop Smiling, The New York Sun, and The L Magazine.) For notes on my superfun programming experience, drop me a line.
On the editorial side, I worked as editor-in-chief of Film Comment magazine, where I was in editorial for 15 years in all. There I assigned and edited both web and print, hosted The Film Comment Podcast and Talks, curated and hosted Film Comment Selects screenings, learned from brilliant writers, and wrote a lot, including interviews with Spike Lee, Robert Pattinson, Juliette Binoche, Pedro Costa, and Frederick Wiseman. Film Comment received the Film Heritage Award from the National Society of Film Critics.
Feel free to get in touch re: writing, editing, moderating, programming, podcasting, etc.
nicolas.rapold@gmail.com