Refresh for latest…: Venice Film Festival chief Alberto Barbera is announcing the lineup for the event’s 80th edition this morning. We’ll be updating the list as the films are revealed, so check back for more below. You can also watch the livestream here.
While Venice weathered Covid with aplomb, never once being forced to cancel during the pandemic while adapting to new protocols, it’s facing a challenge of a different sort this year given the ongoing WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. A key launchpad for awards season and a prime media opportunity for talent, a lower wattage turnout is expected with a smaller U.S. presence than usual on the Lido, as studios are understandably jittery about launching projects without celebrity support.
Already, MGM’s Zendaya-starrer Challengers from fest regular Luca Guadagnino, which had been set to open the proceedings on August 30, ended up bowing out of the slot and moving off of its September 15 domestic release date amid the labor action. The fest replaced it with Italian WWII movie Comandante by Edoardo de Angelis, starring Pierfrancesco Favino.
Titles we still expect to hear unveiled this morning include the Michael Mann-directed Ferrari starring Adam Driver and Penélope Cruz while Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla, Bradley Cooper’s Maestro and Yorgos Lanthimos’s Poor Things have also been widely tipped. We’ve also heard that Netflix could potentially bring David Fincher’s The Killer to the Lido.
Confirmed is the world premiere of J. A. Bayona’s Netflix survival thriller La Sociedad De La Nieve (Society of the Snow) which will close the fest on September 9.
Damien Chazelle is president of the jury for this year’s edition which runs August 30-September 9.
Check back as we update the list of films announced today: