The Venice Film Festival unveiled its star-studded lineup for the 80th edition of the famed annual movie contest on Tuesday, despite the ongoing SAG-AFTRA actors and WGA writers strikes.
Bradley Cooper‘s Leonard Bernstein drama Maestro, Sofia Coppola‘s Priscilla Presley biopic, Michael Mann’s Ferrari, David Fincher‘s The Killer and Ava DuVernay’s Origin will all make their world debuts at the September film festival.
However, organisers are unsure if the big names behind the films will bring the usual Hollywood glamour to the picturesque docks and red carpets of Venice due to the strikes, which mean actors cannot promote projects from studios and streamers, which the union is negotiating with.
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The prestigious film festival has already lost one high-profile premiere to the disputes. Zendaya tennis drama Challengers, by director Luca Guadagnino, was originally slated for an opening night spot before MGM announced it was pushing the movie’s release date to April 2024.
Alberto Barbera, director of the Venice Film Festival, said on Tuesday the line-up had been finalised before the strikes were announced and their effects on the festival had otherwise been minimal.
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“The other American movies we had invited and have been confirmed and will be present,” he said, noting stars from independent movies will be able to attend, meaning the red carpets “will not be empty”.
Opening the festival on August 30 is Comandante, an Italian period drama from director Edoardo De Angelis starring Pierfrancesco Favino, who starred in The Traitor. Society of the Snow from J.A. Bayona will close the festival on September 9.
Also in competition will be Priscilla, an A24 film based on Priscilla Presley’s memoir Elvis and Me, starring Cailee Spaeny in the titular role and Australian actor Jacob Elordi as Elvis.
The film, which was recently slammed by the Presley estate officials, was widely expected to be in the festival after Coppola also launched Somewhere at Venice in 2010.
Priscilla will be competing for the Golden Lion alongside Ferrari, the buzzy racing drama starring Adam Driver as Enzo Ferrari, and Penélope Cruz as his wife Laura, based on Brock Yates’ biography.
Yorgos Lanthimos’ highly anticipated Poor Things, which stars Emma Stone and Mark Ruffalo, will also have its bow on the Lido. Lanthimos previously launched The Favourite at Venice in 2019; it would go on to score 10 Oscar nominations and win one.
DuVernay makes history as the first African American woman to compete in Venice with her film, Origin. Starring Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor, the movie is based on the book Caste and the life of its author, Pulitzer winner Isabel Wilkerson.
Netflix will once again have a big presence at the festival with Maestro, directed by and starring Cooper as the legendary composer, opposite Carey Mulligan as Felicia Montealegre, and Fincher’s The Killer, with Michael Fassbender playing an assassin. The streamer is also bringing Pablo Larraín’s El Conde, a dark comedy in which Augusto Pinochet is a vampire.
Another buzzy competition title is Michel Franco’s Memory, with Jessica Chastain and Peter Skarsgaard.
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Venice has never been a festival to shy away from controversial directors and has programmed new films from both Roman Polanski and Woody Allen.
Polanski is back for the first time since 2019 with The Palace, about a New Year’s Eve in 1999 in a Swiss hotel, with John Cleese and Mickey Rourke. Allen is debuting his first French movie, Coup de Chance. Luc Besson, who was recently cleared of charges in a rape case, will also be on the Lido with Dogman, starring Caleb Landry Jones.
La La Land director Damien Chazelle will head up this year’s international jury, with directors Jane Campion, Martin McDonagh, and last year’s Golden Lion winner Laura Poitras also judging.
Venice is a top launching ground for awards hopefuls and has, in recent years, debuted Oscar-nominated films like Cooper’s directorial debut in 2018 A Star is Born, La La Land, and more recently The Whale, The Banshees of Inisherin, Tár and The Power of the Dog.
It’s also the first major stop of the busy film festival season, with London, Toronto, Telluride and the New York Film Festivals following closely behind.
Last year there were viral moments aplenty thanks to the cast of Don’t Worry Darling and the alleged “spit-gate”, in which internet spectators wondered if Harry Styles had spit on his co-star Chris Pine at the film’s premiere.
The 2023 Venice Film Festival runs from August 30 through to September 9.
– Reported with CNN and Associated Press.
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