The complete program of Venezia75 has been unveiled, an awesome Venice Film Festival: David Cronenberg, Damien Chazelle, Vanessa Redgrave and Guillermo del Toro will be back. We will see the highly-anticipated participation of Zhang Yimou and Shin’ya Tsukamoto and an array of stars including Ryan Gosling, Lady Gaga, Jake Gyllenhaal, Jude Law and Natalie Portman. Do not miss the cartoon movie Zerocalcare and the last unfinished masterpiece by Orson Welles.
Lorenzo Mattotti, beloved illustrator and cartoonist, has created the manifesto of Venice75, the Venice Film Festival that offers from August 29th to September 8th a stellar program: Damien Chazelle, Alfonso Cuaron and the Coen brothers are coming back to the Lagoon; the amazing Zhang Yimou with the long-awaited Shadow, a wuxiapian colossal, and the master of Japanese Cyberpunk Shin’ya Tsukamoto.
For the first time Film Director Bradley Cooper brings to Venice Lady Gaga, we are expecting a hot Red Carpet. The contending Italians are Luca Guadagnino, Roberto Minervini and Mario Martone, while the Orizzonti section opens with the first work by Alessio Cremonini, On my skin, dedicated to the last days of Stefano Cucchi’s life and interpreted by the Madrino of the last festival, Alessandro Borghi.
We will see an array of Stars including Ryan Gosling, Jake Gyllenhaal, Joaquin Phoenix, Jude Law, Tilda Swinton, Juliette Binoche, Natalie Portman, who will lit up the catwalks of the Lido for the joy of the fans; while the Biennale chooses once again to go against the flow with a new Madrino to present the opening evening on August 29th and to present the Golden Lions on September 8th of the 75th Venice Film Festival: the actor and theatrical author Michele Riondino.
The Other Side of the Wind is the film that Orson Welles was trying to complete during the last phase of his life. Left unfinished on more than a thousand reels in a Paris vault until 2017, it will see the light in Venice thanks to the gigantic enterprise of his collaborators and family, and thanks to Netflix who has produced the film and also the documentary of its realization. Netflix will arrive triumphant at the Film Festival with four other films, including the Coen brothers’ western movie.
We are so enthusiastic about the film program and we promise not to miss the film version of the comic strip of Zerocalcare. We are ready to tell you all about the Festival that will open on the evening of Wednesday August 29th with the world premiere of the film by Chazelle First Man with Ryan Gosling, who will see Guillermo del Toro, winner of the last edition, as President of the Jury; he will also hand to David Cronenberg and Vanessa Redgrave the Career Golden Lion.
After the press conference where the President of the Venice Biennale Paolo Baratta and the Festival Director Alberto Barbera have presented the entire program of the 75th Venice Film Festival (Here the recording of the live streaming), Venezia da Vivere is organizing the team that will tell you all about the festival: images of the red carpet, stories on Instagram of the press conferences, live streaming on Facebook of the arrivals of the actors at the Hotel Excelsior dock: it’s like every year a moment we love, and you can take part in it through our LIVE and by using the hashtag #Venezia75.
Two American directors will return to the Lagoon, Venice has brought them a lot of luck. Guillermo del Toro and Damien Chazelle. Winner of the Golden Lion last year for the film The Shape of Water and four Academy Awards including Best Picture and Best Director, Del Toro is the president of this year’s jury. A curiosity: it is not the first time that a director returns to Venice to preside over the jury of the exhibition the year after having triumphed: it happened also in 1985 for Krysztov Zanussi, winner the previous year with the film The year of the quiet sun.
The Oscar winner Damien Chazelle returns to Venice too. Only two years ago he presented La La Land (Volpi Cup for the best female interpretation to Emma Stone), which then won 14 Oscar® nominations, winning six, including the one for Best Film Director. Chazelle will again have the honour of opening the event with First Man, the compelling story of the mission of the first man landing on the moon, focusing on the figure of Neil Armstrong during the years 1961 to 1969. The film was written by Josh Singer, screenwriter of Spotlight, another film that after having impressed the public of Venice has then triumphed at the Oscars®.
It really looks like that the Venice stage will again bring luck to US filmmakers: the main actor in the film by Chazelle is Ryan Gosling. For the premiere of La La Land the American Star did not come to the Lagoon because he was involved in the filming of Denis Villeneuve’s Blade Runner 2049. Who knows maybe this year the expectations on the Lido red carpet will be rewarded.
The director David Cronenberg will undoubtedly be on the red carpet for whom the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement has been announced. The last time we saw him was at the Lido in 2011 with A Dangerous Method and before again in 2008 in unusual photographer’s clothes, to present the project “Red Cars“, a photographic exhibition inspired by the screenplay of a film never made that should have had Mel Gibson as main actor. On that occasion it was really pleasant to listen to him speaking freely about cinema and his passions on the Excelsior terrace.
Next to the Excelsior, another one of the Lido’s historical hotels will return to shine during the Festival: the Biennale is setting up an exhibition on the history of the Film Festival, with the materials of its Historical Archives, at the Grand Hotel Des Bains, which has been closed for years.
The exhibition will open a few days before the Mostra del Cinema and will remain open until October; it is curated by Alberto Barbera and includes photos, films, documents and mostly unpublished materials of the entire history of the International Cinematographic Art Exhibition; this is the oldest film festival in the world, which was born in 1932 at the Venice Lido as an inspiration and an extension of the Biennale Arte.
We will tell you about the exhibition and we will finally be able to photograph the Hotel Des Bains, but in the meantime you can go to Luchino Visconti’s film Morte a Venezia to see the splendid interiors, a theatre of the impossible love between von Aschenbach and Tadzio.
Surely many of these images will bring us back to the glamorous atmospheres of the past decades when Orson Welles animated the evenings of Harry’s Bar and Sophia Loren was posing on the terrace of the Hotel Excelsior.
And in a search for glamorous moments and behind-the-scenes stories, as well as talking about films, Venezia da Vivere will again organise its “Caffè con Veneziadavivere” to find out all about the exhibition with the lightness of a morning talk while having a coffee with friends.
And to talk about the parties and what happens after the show, we will also add the section “Spritz with VDV” … but this is another story and we’ll tell you about it very soon!
Article by Pietro Gallina and Laura Scarpa. Photo by Pietro Gallina, Rossana Viola, Marco Paris, Marco Valmarana for Veneziadavivere. Front and back cover photos by Marco Paris.
