Discover all the previews of the #Venezia81 Film Festival, at the Lido from August 28 to September 7, including films, directors, and TV series with the guide by Venezia da Vivere in collaboration with VeneziaCinema.com
Great directors, world premieres, and a true shower of international stars are ready to transform the Venice Lido into the stage for the 81st Venice International Film Festival, with a program that promises sparks, from August 28 to September 7.
Led by director Alberto Barbera, the event will host screenings of highly anticipated films such as Broken Rage by Takeshi Kitano, Finalement by Claude Lelouch, and bold works like Beetlejuice Beetlejuice by Tim Burton and L’orto americano by Pupi Avati. Among the most anticipated novelties is Joker: Folie à Deux by Todd Phillips with Joaquin Phoenix and Lady Gaga, and the tribute to the Divine Maria Callas by Pablo Larraín starring Angelina Jolie. We are eager to see the films in competition: Queer by Luca Guadagnino, based on the novel by William S. Burroughs, and The Room Next Door by Pedro Almodóvar.
The godmother Sveva Alviti will kick off the ceremonies in the Sala Grande with a series of events culminating in the presentation of the competition awards on September 7; this year, the great French actress Isabelle Huppert serves as President of the jury.
Opening films
L’oro di Napoli is the film chosen for the pre-opening, on the evening of Tuesday, August 27. An anthology film from 1954 directed by Vittorio De Sica and based on the collection of short stories of the same name by Giuseppe Marotta, starring Eduardo De Filippo, Sophia Loren, Silvana Mangano, Paolo Stoppa and Totò.
The official start of the festival will be marked, on the evening of Wednesday, August 28, by the long-awaited Beetlejuice Beetlejuice by Tim Burton, with Michael Keaton, Winona Ryder, Monica Bellucci and Willem Dafoe, recently appointed as Artistic Director of the next Biennale Teatro.
The film, presented in the Out of Competition section, is the sequel to Beetlejuice (1988), one of the American director’s first films. More than 35 years later, Burton has managed to bring back many actors from the original film, who will all parade on the inaugural red carpet where, in addition to authorities and celebrities, Isabelle Huppert and the other jurors will be present, including director Andrew Haigh, our own Giuseppe Tornatore, and Chinese actress Zhang Ziyi from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.
Battle of the Lions
In the following days, directors who need no introduction will compete for the coveted Golden Lion, and in many cases, they could even aim for a “double,” such as Pedro Almodóvar (Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement in 2019), Gianni Amelio (Golden Lion in 1988 for The Way We Laughed), Luca Guadagnino (Silver Lion in 2022 for Bones and All), or Brady Corbet (Lion of the Future in 2015).
Among the “returning lions,” there will notably be Todd Phillips with the highly anticipated Joker: Folie à Deux, the sequel to the film with which the American director won the Golden Lion in 2019, two Golden Globes, and two Oscars. Alongside Joaquin Phoenix (Joker), the singer and actress Lady Gaga will appear as Harley Quinn, following her extraordinary performance at the opening ceremony of the Paris 2024 Olympics.
The Golden Lions for Lifetime Achievement have already been announced and will be presented during the festival: to the Australian director and screenwriter Peter Weir, known for films such as Dead Poets Society and The Truman Show, and to the American actress Sigourney Weaver, star of the iconic role of Ellen Ripley in Alien and its sequels, the cult classics Ghostbusters I and Ghostbusters II, and Avatar by James Cameron, a revolutionary film for visual effects and one of the highest-grossing films in cinema history, with over $2.8 billion at the box office.
In Competition, there will also be Pablo Larrain, with an Italian-German co-production that also features our own Pierfrancesco Favino and Alba Rohrwacher in the cast. The Chilean director returns to tell the stories of great female figures (again in Venice): after bringing Jackie Kennedy (Natalie Portman) and Lady Diana (Kristen Stewart) to the screen, in Maria he has entrusted the role of Maria Callas to Angelina Jolie.
A shower of Hollywood stars and films from all over the world
Who knows if Angelina Jolie might cross paths, among hotels, press conferences, and social events, with her ex-husband, Brad Pitt, who will be at the Festival for Wolfs by Jon Watts (Out of Competition), in which he stars alongside his friend George Clooney.
And in addition to all the stars already mentioned, truly many world-famous actors and actresses will parade on the red carpet: Tilda Swinton, Julianne Moore, Nicole Kidman, Daniel Craig, Jude Law, Nicholas Hoult, Adrien Brody, Antonio Banderas, John Turturro, Guy Pearce, Felicity Jones, Tye Sheridan… just to name a few.
In total, in the main sections, 83 films, 17 short films, and 5 TV series will be screened, representing 59 different countries, in addition to restored classics, the works of Venice Immersive (a section dedicated to virtual reality), and the parallel reviews International Critics’ Week and Venice Days.
In presenting this edition, Alberto Barbera emphasized how the selected works maintain a strong connection with reality, representing a “formidable opportunity for reflection and mirroring of themes pertaining to the human and, in particular, a mirror of contemporary problems, a window wide open to the continuous conflicts, unresolved contradictions, emerging clashes, and unexpected tragedies looming over the battered planet.”
At the same time, this edition attempts to represent the reality of a changing “cinema universe,” whose most significant trends it has sought to anticipate.
Many Italian films will be presented and many figures from our cinema will be present in Venice: Alessandro Borghi, Tommaso Ragno, Toni Servillo, Elio Germano and Pietro Castellitto, just to name a few.
And while the works of Persian directors have always shone in Venice, this year only one film will arrive from Iran: a short film Nime Baz, Nime Basteh (Ajar) by Atefeh Jalali (Orizzonti Short Films).
For lovers of this cinema, we highlight some films present in the parallel sections: Milad Tangshir (an Iranian who has lived in Italy for over 10 years) will present his Anywhere, Anytime during the International Critics’ Week, while Boomerang, the refined debut by Shahab Fotouhi, will be presented in Venice Days. Both films will compete for the Lion of the Future – Luigi De Laurentiis Venice Award for a Debut Film.
Small and large curiosities
Opening and Closing Evenings: The opening ceremony will be held on Wednesday, August 28, with actress Sveva Alviti in the role of Godmother, while the closing ceremony will take place on Saturday, September 7, also hosted by Alviti. Isabelle Huppert will preside over the international jury that will award the Golden Lion for best film and other official prizes.
Venice Production Bridge: from August 29 to September 3, the Venice Production Bridge will offer a platform for the presentation and production of new projects, with services and areas reserved for film industry professionals.
Evening events and parties: every evening during the festival, there will be interviews, meetings with directors and actors, as well as parties held in the palaces and gardens of the Venice Casino. These evening and night events represent an opportunity to see movie stars up close and participate in a series of social and networking activities.
Preparations are already underway for Fantaisie, the 15th party at the Hotel Danieli, organized by Variety, which will take place on the evening of Tuesday, August 27, at the Restaurant Terrazza Danieli, where members of the International Jury as well as VIPs and international movie stars are expected.
The gala evening organized by the foundation for AIDS research – AmfAR Venice, has been confirmed; it will be held on Sunday, September 1, at the Hangar Nicelli on the Lido, with special guest Kelly Rowland.
During the Festival period, we also remind you of other important cultural events in Venice such as the Historical Regatta (Sunday, September 1), the third edition of Homo Faber: The Journey of Life (from September 1 to 30) on the island of San Giorgio, and two sections dedicated to Venice and its artisans with Homo Faber in the City and On the occasion of Homo Faber, the Festival of Politics (in Mestre from September 5 to 8) and the Venice Glass Week (from September 14 to 22) with the hashtag-title #AWorldOfGlass.
The #Venezia81 poster
The official poster of the 81st Venice International Film Festival depicts an Elephant in the Lagoon. It was created for the seventh consecutive year by the Italian illustrator and author Lorenzo Mattotti, who chose the elephant as the central element to represent the memory, history, and magic of cinema.
A multicolored elephant inspired by an unusual and memorable event organized by the director of the Biennale’s Theater Department, Maurizio Scaparro, during the 1981 Biennale Carnival: as part of a carnival parade, a real elephant crossed the city’s streets, becoming a symbol of wonder and surprise with a touch of the exotic.
Mattotti explained that the elephant is the meeting of different cultures, a bridge between East and West, a meeting of different civilizations and cultures that has always characterized the Venice Biennale, and it also represents cinema’s ability to cross time and space, carrying with it a cargo of stories and imagery. The figure of the elephant moving through the lagoon is like a journey through the fantasy, mystery, and magic that cinema can offer.
Lorenzo Mattotti lives and works in Paris and is an important figure in the world of illustration and comics. In addition to creating the Venice Film Festival poster, Mattotti is also the author of the event’s opening sequence for the sixth consecutive year. In 2019, he presented his first animated feature film at the Cannes Film Festival to great critical and public success, The Bears’ Famous Invasion of Sicily, based on the novel written and illustrated by Dino Buzzati and published in 1945.
Biennale Cinema 2024
81st Venice International Film Festival
Venice Lido, 28.08 – 7.09 2024
Venezia da Vivere will follow the entire Festival and the September events, publishing information and curiosities about everything that will happen with A coffee with Venezia da Vivere: day by day, inside and outside the film palace. Continue to follow us on the website and on our social media!
Article by Pietro Gallina from veneziacinema.com with the collaboration of Lucia Pecoraro.
Photos kindly provided by the Press Office of La Biennale di Venezia – Cinema section.
