The 83rd Venice Film Festival reaches its climax on Saturday night at the Palazzo del Cinema, where international jury president Maggie Gyllenhaal and her panel unveil the winners of the Golden Lion and other major prizes during the festival’s closing awards ceremony.
Inside the Sala Grande Awards Ceremony
The 83rd edition of the Venice Film Festival concludes this evening inside the Sala Grande at the Palazzo del Cinema venue, with the ceremony starting at 7pm CEST (6pm BST). Italian actors Greta Scarano and Nicolas Maupas host the final event after opening the festival together earlier in the week. The competition jury, led by U.S. actress and filmmaker Maggie Gyllenhaal alongside members including Hong Kong filmmaking giant Johnnie To, Afghan filmmaker Shahrbanoo Sadat, French director and screenwriter Xavier Giannoli, “The Brutalist” composer Daniel Blumberg, U.S.-based Italian film academic Francesco Casetti, and Kaouther Ben Hania, prepared to award eight key prizes, including the coveted Golden Lion for best film.
As stars walked the Lido red carpet for the final time, the ceremony also served as a moment to honor the legacy of Oscar-winning British producer Jeremy Thomas, who died on Friday at the age of 77. Gianluca Farinelli, head of Italy’s Bologna Film Archives and artistic director of Italy’s David di Donatello Awards, remembered the producer during the proceedings, stating: He loved cinema; cinema made by humans and not by AI. He deeply loved our country. He produced masterpieces, also by great Italian directors.
Thomas won a best picture Oscar for Bernardo Bertolucci’s The Last Emperor
in 1988, one of nine Academy Awards for the film, and made five features across 17 years with the Italian director. Added Italian actor and producer Riccardo Scamarcio, who won the Horizons best actor prize for “The Children of the “Monkey”: Jeremy, a great man of cinema. I salute you, my friend!
Volpi Cup Winners and Acting Honors
Major acting prizes drew significant attention ahead of the final envelope drops. John Malkovich claimed the Volpi Cup for best actor for his role in Martin McDonagh’s Wild Horse Nine. The film, a pitch-black buddy comedy co-starring Sam Rockwell as CIA operatives in Chile in the 1960s, boasted a great outing from Malkovich who gives a sharp and surprisingly touching performance as a veteran CIA agent facing a self-reckoning and emerged as a major crowd-pleaser going out worldwide via Searchlight Pictures.
In the best actress race, Danish star of May el-Toukhy’s Woman Unknown Mathilde Arcel secured the Volpi Cup. Set against the backdrop of World War II, she plays Marie, a young nanny and housemaid about to marry her wealthy, older, and widowed employer, guarding a shameful secret that threatens to unravel the life she’s built.
Horizons Section and Sidebar Victories
The Horizons (Orizzonti) sidebar celebrated distinct international voices. Ann Sirot and Raphaël Balboni took the top Horizons prize for Diane in the Loop, a Belgian feature about a woman who sets out avenging her mother when she finds out she was raped three years before Diane’s birth. Meanwhile, Jacqueline Lentzou nabbed best director for A Day in the Life of Jo: Chapter Phaedra, a film inspired by the real-life killing of a teenager by police in Athens in 2008. Additional Horizons honors went to Laleh Marzban, who became emotional upon receiving the best actress prize for Falling House, and Riccardo Scamarcio, who won best actor for Children of the Monkey. Additional winners announced include Tommaso Landucci and Damian Femert for best screenplay for The Children of the Monkey, and Shaden Safieddine Tazi for best short film for A Few Moments Of Happiness. Auguste Bernard Kouemo Yanghu’s House Of The Wind won the Luigi De Laurentiis award for debut film and the Horizons special jury prize.
Ahead of the main ceremony, parallel sections announced their own winners. Maria Aparicio’s Argentinian film Sometimes Sadness, Sometimes Rebellion won the Director’s Award in the independent Giornate degli Autori sidebar, with Tommaso Usberti’s Before The War taking two prizes including best film in Critics’ Week. US actors Ellen Burstyn and George Clooney both received Golden Lion awards for Lifetime Achievement at this year’s festival. The festival closes this evening with the world premiere of Giovanni Veronesi’s Italian feature Dio Ride, playing in Venice Open – Out of Competition.
Festival Favorites and Pre-Ceremony Contenders
Talk on the Lido prior to the announcement centered on several prominent entries. Among the frontrunners for the Golden Lion is NAZA, a documentary from Israeli directors Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor, and a late addition to the Venice lineup, which features testimony from 24 Israeli military officers outlining the systems and protocols they allege Israel uses to target and kill civilians in Gaza. The film’s title, NAZA, comes from an acronym the Israeli military uses as a shorthand for civilian casualties, and its Venice premiere was a sensation, with the gala audience giving it a record-breaking 25-minute standing ovation. Another favorite going into the awards is Possible Love from acclaimed Korean auteur Lee Chang-dong (Burning), a social drama about a struggling working class family and the well-to-do documentarian who picks them as a subject for her new film that received some of the best reviews out of Venice. Other films in the running for the Golden Lion include Lance Oppenheim’s “Primetime,” Danny Boyle’s “Ink,” Casey Affleck’s “Company,” Werner Herzog’s Bucking Fastard,
Hirokazu Kore-eda’s “Look Back,” Martin McDonagh’s Wild Horse Nine,
and Florian Zeller’s “Bunker.”
Ещё по этой теме
