We’ve all seen and may even own Christmas stocking books like 1001 Movies You Have to Watch Before You Die, but British artist-curator and author Stanley Schtinter’s new book, Last Movies, offers an intriguing twist on the “before you die”, aspect by compiling a list of the actual films that a host of famous characters watched before their deaths.

From Franz Kafka — whose last cinematic experience was the decidedly un-Kafkaesque Charlie Chaplin comedy The Kid — to grunge legend Kurt Cobain, who watched Jane Campion’s quietly devastating masterpiece The Piano before he took his own life in April 1994, Schtinter has turned a macabre fascination into a fascinating exploration of cinema and what his historical characters’ final watching preferences might add to our understanding of them...

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