The first feature by the celebrated visual artist traces a day in the lives of two quietly unhappy mothers whose paths barely intersect — though their experiences overlap considerably.
By Guy Lodge
Plus IconGuy Lodge
Film Critic
@guylodge See All
Killer Films It’s the Fourth of July in “The Last Day,” and the weather is playing ball: the kind of soft, slouchy summer heat made for a leafy garden party. But a chill runs through Rachel Rose‘s elegantly restrained, internalized character study. It crisps the edges of the film’s immaculately lit frames and causing its two principal characters, tautly played by Alicia Vikander and Victoria Pedretti, to stiffen slightly, unable to give themselves over to the day’s balmy mood. Both are mothers, and holiday or not, there’s much to be done: caterers to organize, groceries to buy, pediatrician appointments to keep, meds to take. But Rose’s film isn’t a standard portrait of domestic discontent, grasping instead at something harder and less tangible to articulate: the sense that you’ve slid out of step with your own life.
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