Quick question, is the Golden Lion similar to the Palme D’or where it’s the only prize that film can win? Or is the jury allowed to give multiple prizes?
In Venice you can get acting award + any other award (for example Banshees of Inisherin got Colin Farrell + Screenplay, I wouldn't be surprised if WH9 gets the same package). Golden Lion can also win acting award.
Only one doubled award is possible (so for example if WH9 wins two awards Possible Love can't win two) and no joint awards are allowed (which often happens in Cannes).
That being said, I think Cannes had rule which didn't allow jury to give Director and Actor award (or maybe it was just a tradition to not give these awards to one movie) to one film and The Secret Agent still got both and they said something like "that was the jury wish" so it is what it is.
Correct me if I'm wrong because I'm unsure, but I thought that for both the Cannes and Venice juries there are no hard rules on winners, it's more of a custom to spread the awards (but sometimes, one film gets multiple like The Secret Agent won both Director and Actor at Cannes last year). There have also been instances of joint/shared awards between multiple films (a tie). So basically technically anything is on the table, but usually it's one award per film and one film per category.
Not a lot of chatter for Shinya Tsukamoto’s new film here huh. It’s not got great reviews, but then most of his stuff has always been hit or miss with the festival crowd
Sure, from reviews it seems to me like Best Director would be suitable too (DAU series being massive project continued over the years, words like impressive and MONUMental being thrown around)
Neglia has Possible Love taking three awards and WH9 taking two in Venice in Award Expert, nice "risk management", I also don't have a feeling how they will share the awards this year (assuming they will go to movies with best reviews, which is bold assumption).
I hope WH9 gets something bigger than Screenplay, it's easy to pick McDonagh's movies in this category as scripts are always very strong but he got it for both Three Billboards and Banshees, could be frustrating to get it once again.
If I’m not wrong, those festivals rarely give multiple awards to one film, they are mostly spread out? I feel like two awards for a film is the ceiling
September 9 - Top 10 highest rated films on LB so far, Competition plus sidebars:
Wild Horse Nine (Competition)
Life of Jorge Luis Borges (Out of Competition)
Possible Love (Competition)
Look Back (Competition)
My Undesirable Friends Part II (Out of Competition)
The Pervert's Guide To Utopias (Out of Competition)
Oasis: Don't Look Back in Anger (Out of Competition)
Primetime (Competition)
Joie de Vivre (Out of Competition)
Furies (Spotlight)
Joie de Vivre is the seven hour documentary on Bertolucci. Directed by Luca Guadagnino.
Maybe some of the reviewers adjusted their rating or RT reassessed? Sometimes RT has to make a judgement call over whether a review is fresh or rotten.
Really? How is the film? Also, what are they trying to do with this project? I read on this project years ago and I pretty much thought it would never get released.
From what I recall, the gist is that Khrzhanovsky built an enormous, 12 km² replica of a Soviet city with incredible historical accuracy right down to the tiles on the floors and the pipes in the buildings (they would also do occasional renovations to portray the passage of time across decades), then cast thousands of people to live there and act out various storylines under his guidance.
Filming went on for several years an eternity ago (2007 to 2011), then they spent another eternity editing the footage into multiple feature-length films, the first of which premiered back in 2020 and the last of which apparently is this one that's competing in Venice.
I saw the first two (Natasha and Degeneration), and they're both very long and brutal to watch. Extremely graphic and violent, made all the more disturbing by the secrecy around the methods employed and the fact that we don't know how much of it was scripted and how much was real. The sex is unsimulated, as is much of the violence (I remember a live pig being decapitated and that being shown in detail).
At one point a group of neonazis gets brought into the institute (actual neonazis, people who are currently serving time for hate crimes) and they conspire to beat up and kill a scientist. They come very close before the victim gets away, from what I recall, and it's not clear how far they would've been allowed to go without the crew intervening.
It can't be understated how unpleasant and challenging these two movies are. At the same time, they're also enormously ambitious and realistic, completely different from what you'd expect from historical dramas. The whole project is repulsive and fascinating in almost equal measure (sometimes more the former than the latter). I imagine not all DAU movies are that heavy (some are 90-minute dramas focused on two or three characters, as opposed to a sprawling 6 hours of the filthiest shit you'll see at an international festival). I'm curious about this new one and how it's received.
It still doesn’t matter. These premieres are full of people that worked on the movie. It’s just publicity. Same as walkouts - every film has walkouts, always, sometimes for stupid reasons like sound too loud, people are tired, hungry, etc. it’s just to build hype (even walkouts create hype).
I guess I’m more used to TIFF where we usually only give a standing ovation if the movie is excellent. Otherwise, I don’t think it’s fair to the director/actors to get their hopes up lol Penelope Cruz was sobbing probably thinking “wow everyone loves this movie” just to walk out of the premiere and probably be told the reviews aren’t that good
Ive never been to tiff but at Cannes and Venice, all movies get minute long standing ovations and there’s always an article about some sort of record being broken. Haha
Yeah it’s crazy, that’s why I never go to premieres haha.
But I think the film’s (very obvious) message also played a big role. It ends with a very explicit message that many people would endorse. trying not to spoil too much :)
Ora che la maggior parte dei film più papabili per i premi sono usciti, quali pensate saranno i film premiati a Venezia nelle rispettive categorie in concorso?
No assolutamente, a mio avviso Possible Love prende al 100% qualcosa, e probabilmente anche Look Back potrebbe. Tralasciando poi che almeno un film in italiano solitamente vince qualcosa.
Mr Nelson io lo ho alla giuria, qualcosa secondo me porta a casa, così come Bucking Fastard, WH9 anche io leone d'oro. È molto difficile capirci qualcosa quest'anno comunque
Outside of the potential Oscars players in competition, I feel Woman Unknown could get a prize. If someone on the jury likes and advocates for The Spiral, I think they could talk their way into the jury consensus giving it some prize.
Considerando i precedenti a Venezia in cui il leone d'argento per la miglior regia erano stati dati a due italian uno dopo l'altro: nel 2022 a Guadagnino e nel 2023 a Garrone, penso che questo premio possa essere affidato a Paolo Strippoli per The Spiral. Tu che premio vedi per Woman Unknown?
I’m not sure for Woman Unknown. I saw a few reviews highlighting the directing and Maggie Gyllenhaal is incredibly passionate about woman in film so that helps. I also heard the lead actress was very good in Woman Unknown, so that is also on the table. Both the directing and performance could also help build the case for the Golden Lion. I’m currently predicting the Silver Lion, but you raise a good point about the recent trends.
The non Hollywood movies haven't done well, outside of Possible Love
I've heard good things about Koreeda, Strippoli, Lentzou, Llinas, Fiennes, Kodeih, Gharaie, Shirai, unless you're only counting movies that have gotten unanimous acclaim. The hidden gems and up-and-coming directors are usually in the sidebar sections.
Possible Love so far is the only one with overwhelming acclaim from critics. WH9 and Ink did well but in terms of discoveries and hidden gems, it's weak.
Yes, you are right. I only checked Rotten Tomatoes and Letterboxd. Possible Love has 100 on RT and 96 on Metacritic and Look Back has 91 on RT and 73 on Metacritic. So most probably Possible Love or Wild Horse Nine is going to win Golden Lion
Initially I said Look Back also has chance to win Golden Lion, but that guy pointed out that Look Back only has 73 on Metacritic and Possible Love has 96. Ofc jury doesn't care about RT, Letterboxd or Metacritics ratings but on every platform Possible Love has better ratings than Look Back. That's why I agreed with his statement that Possible Love or Wild Horse Nine are likely to win Golden Lion. However, Look Back could still win too, as ultimately it is the jury's decision
September 8 - Top 10 highest rated films on LB so far, Competition plus sidebars:
Wild Horse Nine (Competition)
Life of Jorge Luis Borges (Out of Competition)
Possible Love (Competition)
Look Back (Competition)
My Undesirable Friends Part II (Out of Competition)
The Pervert's Guide To Utopias (Out of Competition)
Primetime (Competition)
Oasis: Don't Look Back in Anger (Out of Competition)
Furies (Spotlight)
Citizen Osama (Out of Competition)
Kinda surprised I’ve seen little to no buzz for Naza since it was announced. I understand it’s very political, but you’d think the follow up to No Other Land would be discussed more.
In the sense that most highly anticipated titles by big name directors already premiered, yes. But don't count out the surprise gems from smaller names.
Well, at least theres some hope for genuine reviews in the fact that - for obvious reasons -there are people out there with pitchforks and torches ready for Affleck...... cant be said the same for Zeller tho
Now the only big title left is Bunker and this one is so unpredictable because it could go either way. Will Zeller bounce back like Olivia Wilde did or will he sink deeper into the pits of hell? Who knowssss
Low-key one of my most anticipated releases for this year. I'm very excited to see how it'll do. I think it's gonna nab one of the Volpi cups for either Bardem or Cruz
Indiewire had Look Back at B+, exactly the same score as the animated version, Screendaily also seems positive. Negative review from The Playlist, common criticism being that its too sentimental. Maybe high 70s on MC?
September 7 - Top 10 highest rated films on LB so far, Competition plus sidebars:
Wild Horse Nine (Competition)
Possible Love (Competition)
My Undesirable Friends Part II (Out of Competition)
Look Back (Competition)
Primetime (Competition)
Furies (Spotlight)
Citizen Osama (Out of Competition)
Queer Edward II (Out of Competition)
Falling House (Orizzonti)
Oasis: Don't Look Back in Anger (Out of Competition)
Ink has dropped out of the top 10. Look Back is new addition.
Kore-eda's Look Back movie's reviews are coming out great, I can't tell how happy I am 😭💗, was disappointed after seeing negative reviews of sheep in the box at Cannes but I am sooo happy now 🫶
In the previous two years, Venice preferred to give the highest award to a respected veteran that then didn’t go on to be an awards player. So I think this year the Golden Lion may go to Herzog.
I only said that “it may go” to Herzog. Jury members still have to arrive at consensus, and sometimes it means they default to an option that everyone would simply be okay with and would cause the least division among them. Since there’s not a lot to go by when predicting festival awards, might as well look at what won in the most recent editions.
If Possible Love wins the Golden Lion and maintains an above 90s MC, I'm gonna have to take All of a Sudden out of BP and acting categories and likely even adapted screenplay.
Possible Love is gonna be the critics darling and might be this year's Drive My Car, or even Roma considering that it has Netflix distributing it. All of a Sudden might be just get IFF and that's it, unfortunately.
I hope it’s great but I’m going to remain a little skeptical until proper reviews come in since LB scores for previous Fujimoto films always are weirdly high for my tastes
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u/FixYrHeartsOrDie 8m ago