Shot in piercing monochrome, Ozon’s visually ravishing version of The Stranger also plays into the book’s enduring cult status as a retro-noir design classic, capturing some of Camus’ own timeless hipster cachet as a kind of rock-star writer-philosopher who died fashionably young. The director has amassed a busy filmography, variable in quality, but this is one of his strongest efforts and should find a broad audience of readymade fans thanks to the Camus connection. Following its Venice world premiere, it is screening at San Sebastian film festival over the coming week.

Set in French-colonial Algiers in the early 1940s, The Stranger reunites Ozon with a cast of former collaborators. Sulky beauty Benjamin Voisin (Summer of ’85) stars as Meursault, the young office worker so disengaged from the hollow conventions of bourgeois society that he ends up fatally shooting an Arab boy for muddled, impulsive reasons which he barely understands himself. Rebecca Marder (The Crime is Mine) plays Meursault’s lover Marie Cardona, half-fascinated and half-disgusted by his callous detachment, while Pierre Lottin (When Autumn Comes) is his hot-headed neighbour Raymond Sintès, whose abusive treatment of his Algerian mistress Djemila (Hajar Bouzaouit) sets these tragic events in motion.

Surprisingly, given its hallowed status, The Stranger has only been filmed once before, by Italian maestro Luschino Visconti in 1967, a slightly overwrought interpretation starring a decade-too-old Marcello Mastroianni as Meursault. Ozon stays more faithful to the book’s blankly cynical tone, though he has added some subtle 21st century touches, allowing the female and Algerian characters a little more depth, and gently foreshadowing the post-colonial future.

As in the novel, the first act mostly deals with Meursault attending his mother’s funeral in the dusty Algerian hinterlands, his refusal to show performative grief to a church full of strangers a seemingly innocuous decision that will later come back to punish him. Soon he is back in the city, swimming and smoking and flirting with Marie, their budding romance tinged with existential ennui. “Do you love me?” she asks. “Love means nothing,” he pouts. Which may well be the most French piece of movie dialogue ever written.

Meursault’s friendship with the boorish, misogynistic Raymond seems equally devoid of moral or emotional weight. On a day trip to the beach, it is Raymond’s gun he uses, killing his victim in a fateful clash that falls somewhere between self-defence and reckless accident. Arrested and tried for the murder, his radical honesty ultimately condemns him, refusing to show hypocritical contrition, turning down fabricated alibis that could save his life, angrily shunning priests offering pious counsel. At one point he blames his fatal actions on sweltering, dazzling sunlight, foolishly defying Michael Jackson’s age-old wisdom. Never blame it on the sunshine, always blame it on the boogie.

The Stranger was published in 1942, more than a decade before Algeria’s anti-colonial war with France began. Born and raised in the French colony, Camus was notoriously equivocal on the conflict, favouring reconciliation over armed struggle. He died in a car crash two years before Algeria achieved independence. But Ozon has managed to incorporate this wider historical hindsight into the story in subtle ways, highlighting anti-occupation graffiti on the streets of Algiers, and stressing the casual racism of the European settlers.

Most significantly, he has given names and a hint of wider back story to the two main Arab characters, Meursault’s murder victim Moussa Hamdani (Abderrahmane Dehkani) and his sister Djemila, Raymond’s mistress. Both were nameless cyphers in the book, a decision which Ozon (and others) defend as a deliberate literary effect to reinforce Meursault’s detachment rather than evidence of racism in Camus himself. Ozon’s choice of the name Moussa may be a sly homage to Algerian author Kamel Daoud’s prize-winning 2013 novel The Meursault Investigation, which re-told The Stranger through the eyes of its Arab characters.

The Stranger received mixed notices at its Venice premiere, with some criticising its laborious pace and Voisin’s blank screen presence. All the same, Meursault remains compelling as an archetype of intellectual rebels and literary anti-heroes, part of a pantheon that includes Dostoevsky’s Raskolnikov and Patricia Highsmith’s Tom Ripley. Indeed, Ozon has alluded to Alain Delon’s iconic portrayal of Ripley in press interviews, though he stops short of making Meursault a chilling sociopath. The novel’s philosophical core, about how to live honestly and purposely in an amoral universe, remain intact here.

Perhaps surprisingly, Ozon also resists the urge to play Meursault’s aloof otherness as Ripley-style coded queerness, though there is a faint flicker of homoerotic tension between killer and victim, while cinematographer Manu Dacosse undoubtedly frames Voisin as a sculpturally beautiful sex object, favouring an aesthetic rooted more in Bruce Weber’s 1980s fashion shoots than in Bresson or Bergman. The film’s high-resolution monochrome visuals are consistently luscious overall, with the rugged desert vistas and shimmering beaches of Morocco standing in for pre-independence Algeria.

Kuwaiti composer Fatima Al Qadiri’s timeless score is another strong element, blending electronics with Arabic instrumentation. An end-credits appearance by The Cure’s “Killing an Arab”, a 1979 post-punk classic inspired by the original Camus novel, is a pleasingly cheeky coda, a perfect audiovisual marriage that waited almost half a century for the stars to align.

Director, producer: François Ozon
Screenwriters: François Ozon, Philippe Piazzo, based on the novel L’Etranger by Albert Camus
Cast: Benjamin Voisin, Rebecca Marder, Pierre Lottin, Denis Lavant, Swann Arlaud, Christophe Malavoy, Nicolas Vaude, Jean-Charles Clichet, Mireille Perrier, Hajar Bouzaouit, Abderrahmane Dehkani, Jérôme Pouly, Jean-Claude Bolle-Reddat, Christophe Vandevelde, Jean-Benoît Ugeux
Cinematography: Manu Dacosse
Editing: Clément Selitzki
Music: Fatima Al Qaddiri
Production designer: Katia Wyszkop
Production company: Foz (France), Gaumont (France), France 2 Cinéma (France)
World sales: Gaumont, Paris
Venue: San Sebastian Film Festival (Perlak)
In French, Arabic
123 minutes

In brief, an enviable year to be attending the festival. Then the awards were announced.

Most would agree with the principle that films are not supposed to be propaganda vehicles dictated by political agendas. But the extreme tension the world is living through has everyone on red alert and girding for regime change and war. Many of the Venice selections reflected the urgency of the moment.

In competition, there was Kathryn Bigelow’s edge-of-seater A House of Dynamite, a disaster thriller about the rising probability of a nuclear war breaking out; and there was Olivier Assayas’s The Wizard of the Kremlin recounting Vladimir Putin’s rise to power from an insider’s perspective. Pietro Marcello’s Duse, featuring a star turn by Valeria Bruni Tedeschi as the great Italian actress, set the whole story against the background of the rise of Fascism and how it affected her life… Well, none of these films won a prize.

But the sheer immediacy and emotion of The Voice of Hind Rajab grabbed audiences by the throat thanks to Tunisian director Kaouther Ben Hania’s intensely moving  reenactment of the Israeli army’s shooting of a 5-year-old Palestinian girl trapped in a car in Gaza, after all efforts of a Red Crescent rescue team proved futile. It captured the hearts of critics and the public alike. And it was generally considered the front-runner for the Golden Lion.

So there was widespread disbelief and even anger among critics (and even many in the awards night audience) when Alexander Payne’s jury handed the festival’s top prize to Jim Jarmusch for Father Mother Sister Brother. Boasting a starry ensemble cast including Adam Driver, Cate Blanchett, Tom Waits and Charlotte Rampling, the veteran U.S. indie director’s whimsical triptych of droll family vignettes is a slight, low-key charmer. But compared to Ben Hania’s much more powerful and emotionally wrenching The Voice of Hind Rajab, this pick for the Golden Lion felt strangely timid and wrong-headed. Great cinema is not obliged to wrestle with prickly real-life issues, of course, but in this context rewarding such an apolitical film as Jarmusch’s felt extremely political. The Voice of Hind Rajab received instead the Silver Lion, the festival’s Grand Jury Prize.

Two other women directors brought impressive, stunningly original, career-high films to competition. Ildiko Enyedi won the Fipresci Prize with Silent Friend, three thematically connected stories set in different time periods at a German university, whose protagonists have a burning desire to communicate with plants. The central character is an ancient and presumably lonely female Gingko biloba tree, and by the end of the film it is hard to doubt this magnificent plant thinks and feels.

One of the most thrillingly original competition premieres was Mona Fastvold’s The Testament of Ann Lee, an audacious avant-garde musical biopic of the messianic British woman who founded the Shakers religious sect in the 18th century. Placing Amanda Seyfried at the whirling centre of an all-singing, all-dancing ensemble cast, Fastvold’s delirious period pageant almost felt like a thematic sister film to her husband and creative partner Brady Corbet’s The Brutalist (2024), another epic study in monomania which made a big splash at Venice last year. Critics were divided, but this is bold, risky, female-driven auteur film-making.

The most prestigious literary adaptation in Venice was Francois Ozon’s achingly cool monochrome take on the classic Albert Camus existentialist novel L’Etranger, which premiered in the main competition. Starring sulky beauty Benjamin Voison as the emotionally numb anti-hero Mersault, who sleepwalks into a random murder, then refuses to save his own life with performative fake remorse, Ozon’s stylish mid-century modernist treatment is meticulously faithful to the text without being reverential. It may well provide the veteran French auteur with a rare international hit.

More unconventional literary works were scattered across the festival program, including two very different films riffing on Dante’s Divine Comedy. The first, simply called Divine Comedy, was a slight but charmingly droll farce about the absurdities of censorship in Iranian cinema from much-banned film-maker Ali Asgari. Meanwhile, Julian Schnabel’s In The Hand of Dante adapted the 2002 Nick Tosches novel about mobsters chasing Dante’s priceless original manuscript into a sprawling, bloated, testosterone-drunk, all-star train-wreck. Think Coppola’s Megalopolis with a plot by Dan Brown. But, amazingly, even less fun than that sounds.

Among the low-key gems tucked away on the Venice fringes was Critics Week closer 100 Nights of Hero. British first-time feature director Julia Jackman makes a charmingly quirky version of Isabel Greenberg’s post-modern graphic novel, a queer feminist fairy tale co-starring Emma Corrin and Maika Monroe. In the Orizzonti section, Thai film-maker Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit depicted a young couple living lives of quiet desperation under late capitalism in his hauntingly bleak workplace drama Human Resource. Meanwhile, the stand-out discovery of Venice Days was 24-year-old Swiss-Kenyan director Damian Hauser’s Memory of Princess Mumbi, a hugely inventive mash-up of tragic love story, meta-fictional docu-thriller and eye-popping AI fantasia. All are fresh talents with bright futures.

An extraordinary second film in Venezia Spotlight was Shahad Ameen’s Hijra, the fast-moving story of a pious elderly women and her two teen granddaughters who are traveling to Mecca to make the pilgrimage of a lifetime when one of the girls suddenly disappears. Narratively and philosophically complex, it opens a respectful but fascinating exploration of Islam.

Two top Latin American directors, Mariana Rondón and Marité Ugás, worked together on another Venezia Spotlight standout, It Would Be Night in Caracas. A woman of almost 40 finds herself all alone in a hostile city when her mother dies. Portraying the violence of the streets, police, gangs and squatters, the film builds a picture of Venezuela as a country of constant tension, fear and danger.  Winning the Orizzonti Award for Best Film was an unforgettable drama from Mexico, En el camino (On the Road) by David Pablos, casting a frank glance at Mexican long-haul truck drivers who relax with drink, drugs and promiscuous sex. In a sordid world imbued with violence and cruelty, a married trucker falls for a 20-year-old boy on the run from the cartel.

Italian genre cinema made a good showing for itself in no less than two midnight screenings, a slot that used to be a fixture in the Marco Müller era and has become a more sporadic occurrence under Alberto Barbera. Most of the headlines focused on Paolo Strippoli’s The Holy Boy, owing to the bigger promotional effort behind it and the director’s track record in Italy, but even more impressive was Virgilio Villoresi’s Orfeo, an independently produced adaptation of the Orpheus myth where mood, performance, animation and passion come together to deliver a journey to the underworld that is brief (74 minutes) but fascinatingly dense.

Circling around to the organizational front, the festival proved, once again, ill-equipped to deal with torrential rain, a feature on the Lido landscape year after year. In 2010, the weather led to the press room to being shut down for most of the day, as the water was leaking onto the floor of the Palazzo del Casinò. This year, a sudden downpour paired with a Q&A running long delayed the start of the press screening for Luca Guadagnino’s After the Hunt, as staff didn’t have the heart to send the people still inside the Sala Darsena to brave the elements. Unfortunately, news of this had failed to reach the journalists waiting outside, some of whom eventually bailed on the screening to avoid the combined effects of air conditioning and soaking wet clothes and shoes. Communication and scheduling could certainly benefit from an upgrade in future editions. And what about putting up some temporary canvas cover during the festival?

The story takes place in the fictional locale of Remis, somewhere in the mountainous parts of (presumably) Friuli Venezia Giulia, where the film was shot. Sergio Rossetti (Michele Riondino), a P.E. teacher and former judo champion from Taranto, is hired as a substitute in the local high school, for what is supposed to be a run-of-the-mill three-month gig. The man, dealing with initially unspecified issues, is so jaded he doesn’t actually pay attention to what his students do, instructing them to run laps while he sneaks out for a cigarette.

One of the teenagers in his class is Matteo Corbin (the impressive young actor Giulio Feltri), who enjoys special privileges. The reason becomes apparent when Sergio’s excessive drinking causes Michela (Romana Maggiora Vergano), the owner of the local inn, to trust him with the explanation behind Remis’ nickname “The valley of Smiles”. Once a week, the locals head to a place of worship where, under the supervision of Matteo’s father Mauro (Paolo Pierobon) and the priest (Roberto Citran), they take turns hugging the young boy, who possesses the ability to absorb their pain and sadness.

This does not cause amnesia: Sergio openly states the feelings he had are still there. “They just don’t hurt anymore.” He therefore takes part in the great secret that has defined life in Remis ever since a tragic train crash that occurred in 2009, leading to the village’s need to cope with grief in this unusual way. Unlike most of the inhabitants, however, the teacher realizes Matteo is still a teenager, with the typical problems that time of one’s life can entail. And who knows what will happen if he figures out his powers could also be used for less noble purposes…

Nothing strictly new under the sun (it’s basically a gender-flipped Carrie by way of Midsommar, only starring some of Italy’s finest character actors), but Strippoli knows how to handle the tension, letting it build up over the course of two hours. Unlike one unlucky character late in the film, The Holy Boy is a slow burner, partly in keeping with the tradition of similarly themed stories and partly, perhaps, to avoid the censorship issues the director faced with Flowing (whose commercial performance domestically was compromised by the restrictive “18” rating).

Through this approach, Strippoli cleverly establishes the contrast between the awe-inspiring Alpine atmosphere and the profoundly rotten society that engages in religiously sanctioned child abuse – Matteo also sees the painful memories, which presumably has exposed him from an early age to images he was not meant to see – to keep up a cheerful façade that will come crashing down sooner or later.

Predictable though it may be, the character study is quietly affecting, which lends even more power to the truly horrific stuff once it occurs, as it concerns people we have grown to care about from the minute Sergio sets foot in a valley that claims to be all about smiles, but will eventually usher in a new era of tears. And by the time the pain comes, Strippoli will be leaving the area with the knowledge he’s once again shown his versatility in the field of European horror. And that is definitely something to smile about.

Director: Paolo Strippoli
Screenwriters: Jacopo Del Giudice, Paolo Strippoli, Milo Tissone
Cast: Michele Riondino, Romana Maggiora Vergano, Paolo Pierobon, Roberto Citran, Giulio Feltri
Producers: Domenico Procacci, Laura Paolucci, Ines Vasiljevi?, Stefano Sardo, Jožko Rutar
Cinematography: Cristiano Di Nicola
Production design: Marcello Di Carlo
Costume design: Susanna Mastroianni
Music: Federico Bisozzi, Davide Toma
Sound: Francesco Morosini
Production companies: Fandango, Nightswim, Spok Films
World sales: Fandango Sales
Venue: Venice Film Festival (Out of Competition)
In Italian
122 minutes

GOLDEN LION for Best Film to:
FATHER MOTHER SISTER BROTHER by Jim Jarmusch (USA, Ireland, France)

SILVER LION – GRAND JURY PRIZE to:
THE VOICE OF HIND RAJAB by Kaouther Ben Hania (Tunisia, France)

SILVER LION – AWARD FOR BEST DIRECTOR to:
Benny Safdie for the film THE SMASHING MACHINE (USA)

COPPA VOLPI for Best Actress:
Xin Zhilei in the film RI GUA ZHONG TIAN (THE SUN RISES ON US ALL) by Cai Shangjun (China)

COPPA VOLPI for Best Actor:
Toni Servillo in the film LA GRAZIA by Paolo Sorrentino (Italy)

AWARD FOR BEST SCREENPLAY to:
Valérie Donzelli and Gilles Marchand for the film À PIED D’ŒUVRE (AT WORK) by Valérie Donzelli (France)

SPECIAL JURY PRIZE to:
SOTTO LE NUVOLE (BELOW THE CLOUDS) by Gianfranco Rosi (Italy)

MARCELLO MASTROIANNI AWARD for Best Young Actor or Actress to:
Luna Wedler in the film SILENT FRIEND by Ildikó Enyedi (Germany, Hungary, France)

Orizzonti

The ORIZZONTI Jury of the 82nd Venice Film Festival, chaired by Julia Ducournau and composed by Yuri Ancarani, Fernando Enrique Juan Lima, Shannon Murphy and RaMell Ross, after screening the 19 feature-length films and 14 short films in competition has decided to award:

ORIZZONTI AWARD FOR BEST FILM to:
EN EL CAMINO (ON THE ROAD) by David Pablos (Mexico)

ORIZZONTI AWARD FOR BEST DIRECTOR to:
Anuparna Roy for the film SONGS OF FORGOTTEN TREES (India)

SPECIAL ORIZZONTI JURY PRIZE to:
HARÀ WATAN (LOST LAND) by Akio Fujimoto (Japan, France, Malasya, Germany)

ORIZZONTI AWARD FOR BEST ACTRESS to:
Benedetta Porcaroli in the film IL RAPIMENTO DI ARABELLA  by Carolina Cavalli (Italy)

ORIZZONTI AWARD FOR BEST ACTOR to:
Giacomo Covi in the film UN ANNO DI SCUOLA (A YEAR OF SCHOOL) by Laura Samani (Italy, France)

ORIZZONTI AWARD FOR BEST SCREENPLAY to:
Ana Cristina Barragán for the film HIEDRA (THE IVY) (Ecuador)

ORIZZONTI AWARD FOR BEST SHORT FILM to:
UTAN KELLY (WITHOUT KELLY) by Lovisa Sirén (Sweden)

Venice Award for a debut film

The LION OF THE FUTURE – “LUIGI DE LAURENTIIS” VENICE AWARD FOR A DEBUT FILM Jury at the 82^nd Venice Film Festival, chaired Charlotte Wells and comprised of Erige Sehiri, and Silvio Soldini, has decided to award:

LION OF THE FUTURE
“LUIGI DE LAURENTIIS” VENICE AWARD FOR A DEBUT FILM to:
SHORT SUMMER by Nastia Korkia (Germany, France, Serbia)
GIORNATE DEGLI AUTORI

Venezia Spotlight

ARMANI BEAUTY AUDIENCE AWARD to:
CALLE MÁLAGA
by Maryam Touzani (Morocco, France, Spain, Germany, Belgium)

Venice Classics

The VENICE CLASSICS Jury, chaired by Tommaso Santambrogio and comprised of 23 students of Cinema, chosen from the professors of Italian University Cinema programmes, has decided to award:

VENICE CLASSICS AWARD FOR BEST DOCUMENTARY ON CINEMA to:
MATA HARI by Joe Beshenkovsky and James A. Smith (USA)

VENICE CLASSICS AWARD FOR BEST RESTORED FILM to:
BASHU, GHARIBEYE KOOCHAK (BASHU, THE LITTLE STRANGER) by Bahram Beyzaie (Iran, 1985)

Venice Immersive

The VENICE IMMERSIVE Jury, chaired by Eliza McNitt and comprised of Gwenael François and Boris Labbé, after viewing the 30 projects in competition has decided to award:

VENICE IMMERSIVE GRAND PRIZE to:
THE CLOUDS ARE TWO THOUSAND METERS UP by Singing Chen (Taipei, Germany)

VENICE IMMERSIVE SPECIAL JURY PRIZE to:
LESS THAN 5GR OF SAFFRON by Négar Motevalymeidanshah (France)

VENICE IMMERSIVE ACHIEVEMENT PRIZE to:
A LONG GOODBYE by Kate Voet and Victor Maes (Belgium, Luxembourg, The Netherlands)

Its narrative arc is obviously a lengthy one compared to the human time frame, but this long, leisurely paced film beguiles the time while the tree’s ancient roots slurp the sap and the leaves renew themselves, connecting the characters and lighting up the audience’s brain waves and pleasure centers. As a film for all ages and tastes from sci-fi to gardening, it should have no trouble crashing the art house barrier.

Communication with plants is the narrative’s connecting thread, but the theme is really human beings’ burning desire to do so – what Enyedi has called the “clumsy attempts of humans to connect with them”.  So we follow the three main characters – a neuroscientist, a farm boy who has made it to university and a young woman who in 1908 became the first woman admitted to study botanical science at the same university – as their adventure of the mind unfolds, sweeping the audience along with it.

Prof. Wong, played with appealing calm and conviction by Tony Leung Chiu-wai, arrives from Hong Kong as a visiting professor in a quiet German university. He is just in time for COVID-19 lockdown and soons finds himself living alone on campus with only a distrustful caretaker (Sylvester Groth) for company. Attracted to an enormous ginkgo tree, he makes the mental leap to trying to read its thoughts and feelings on his sophisticated neurological equipment. His only support is Alice Sauvage (Léa Seydoux), a researcher he finds on Internet, who schools him in the loneliness of a single female tree in a garden.

In a turn-of-the-century story, a young student Grete (a delightfully bold Luna Wedler) is a pioneer for her sex on an all-male campus. You don’t know whether to laugh or cry when a lecherous old prof who is examining her for admission tries to trip her up on Carl Linnaeus’s sexual classification system for plants, or when the bigoted materfamilias who is renting Grete a room tosses her out for taking a morning walk. Homelessness leads to her encounter with an old portrait photographer and learning a new profession, whose connection to latter-day filmmaking is obvious.

Finally, there is the light-hearted story of a geranium that brings two students together during the years of protest in 1972. Hannes (Enzo Brumm), who defines himself as a farm boy who detests plants, makes some major discoveries when his girlfriend leaves him in charge of her geranium, wired up for an experiment.

All these strands are expertly edited together by Károly Szalai in an accelerating rhythm, as the characters’ lives seem to spiral closer and closer together across time, held together in the observing memory of the ancient tree. The final scenes are truly an emotional climax that close the stories in a burst of unity.

Enyedi, whose first feature My 20th Century won the Camera d’Or in Cannes in 1989 and whose 2017 On Body and Soul won the Golden Bear in Berlin, shows she is a master of her craft in Silent Friend, using a wide variety of film techniques to create emotional and intellectual response. Cinematographer Gergely Pálos switches from color in the modern scenes to eye-soothing black-and-white in the historic ones, and from 35mm to 16mm to digital, finding a sensitive balance that holds interest throughout the film’s two and a half hour running time. Especially stunning is the digital time-lapse photography that fills the screen with a seed opening and sprouting, along with other micro-wonders possible from advances in photography.

Director, screenplay: Ildikó Enyedi
Cast: Tony Leung Chiu-wai, Luna Wedler, Enzo Brumm, Sylvester Groth, Martin Wuttke, Johannes Hegemann, Rainer Bock, Léa Seydoux
Producers: Reinhard Brundig, Monika Mécs, Nicolas Elghozi, Morgane Olivier, Meng Xie
Cinematography: Gergely Pálos
Editing: Károly Szalai
Production design: Imola Láng
Costume design: Peri De Braganca
Music: Gábor Keresztes, Kristóf Kelemen
Sound: Michael Schlömer
Production companies: Pandora Film, Inforg-M&M Film, Nicolas Elghozi, Rediance Films
World sales: Films Boutique
Venue: Venice Film Festival (Competition)
In German, English
145 minutes

Coming so soon after James Mangold’s A Complete Unknown (2024), which dramatised Dylan’s controversial switch from acoustic troubadour to electric rocker at Newport festival in 1965, will also help Gordon’s film reach a wider potential audience, engaging younger fans as well as nostalgic Baby Boomers. Indeed, Mangold’s hit bio-drama may have helped get this project commissioned in the first place. With Dylan featured prominently alongside Johnny Cash, Joan Baez, Judy Collins, Pete Seeger and dozens more, Newport & the Great Folk Dream is sure to tour more festivals after Venice, with an encore likely to follow on big or small screen.

The raw material for Newport & the Great Folk Dream was shot between 1963 and 1966 by film-maker Murray Lerner, who directed a previous Newport documentary, the Oscar-nominated Festival! (1967) Some footage of the bigger names, especially Dylan, has been widely circulated ever since. But Gordon and his team have mostly unearthed previously unseen clips from Lerner’s 80-hour archive including John Lee Hooker, Phil Ochs, Odetta, the Staples Singers, Peter, Paul & Mary and many others. Dave Van Ronk, who later inspired the ill-fated folk-scene anti-hero of the Coen brothers film Inside Llewyn Davies (2013), also appears.

Gordon has a solid track record of diligent, prize-winning, music-themed films and books on subjects including Johnny Cash, Muddy Waters, and Stax Records. He also co-directed Best of Enemies (2019), the Oscar-nominated documentary about the bitter personal feud between Gore Vidal and William Buckley Jr. His approach here is sober, meticulous and formally traditional, interweaving monochrome archive footage and interview fragments with a smattering of more recent voice-over audio clips from musicians, festival organisers and other Newport veterans.

Although Lerner’s original film had a jumbled chronology and limited background detail, Gordon brings more narrative shape, tracking the festival’s growth from Kennedy-era egalitarian boutique event to mainstream music industry showcase, struggling to adapt while Beatlemania caused seismic ripples in the pop landscape. There is also some enjoyably bitchy backstage gossip. In archive audio clips, Lerner (who died in 2017) recalls “bickering and squabbling and animosity” between the festival’s board members, with folk purists lined up against others who championed the music as a living, evolving art form. Neither legendary musical archivist Alan Lomax nor Dylan’s manager Albert Grossman emerge from the film with much glory, the pair even getting into a brawl at one point.

An added dimension that Gordon brings to Lerner’s raw material is political context, reframing the festival’s progressive liberal legacy with the wider hindsight of history. Seeger was a key force here, insisting to Newport’s promoter George Wein that every performer got the same 50 dollar fee. “It wasn’t a communist thing,” Wein explains, “it was brotherhood and sisterhood.” James Forman of the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee, plus Charles Neblett and Rutha Harris of the group’s associated band The Freedom Singers, also stress the festival’s connections with Civil Rights and protest marches. “We didn’t consider ourselves performers, we were activists,” Harris says. “Because freedom is a constant struggle.”

Gordon also makes a strong case for Newport’s wider pop-culture significance, boosting not just the folk revival but also resurgent interest in antique blues and country music, bringing old-time performers like Mississippi John Hurt, Skip James and Doc Boggs back for their first public shows in decades. The festival also pioneered the kind of globalised bill that would come to be called “world music”, inviting artists from Africa, the Middle East, Francophone Canada and other regions beyond the Anglosphere. Despite the film’s narrow focus on Newport’s breakthrough 1960s period, the festival is still going today, having survived a few bumpy periods over the decades. Bob Dylan finally returned to play in 2002, wearing a long wig and fake beard. Why? Because he can.

Stylistically limited by its strict adherence to Lerner’s vintage footage, Newport & the Great Folk Dream does little fresh with the music documentary format. But behind its deceptively austere, artless, hand-held aesthetic this deep dive into musical history is actually slickly edited and elegantly structured, with a strikingly clear, cleaned-up audio soundtrack. Gordon and his team even confess to using AI software to polish up a couple of degraded clips from the vaults, but any digital tweaks are very subtle. If Dylan can get away with going electric, so can they.

Director: Robert Gordon
Cinematography: Murray Lerner, George Pickow, Stanley Meredith, Francis Grumman
Editing: Laura Jean Hocking
Producer: Jo Lauro
Production company: Folk Explosion
World sales: Submarine Entertainment, New York
Venue: Venice Film Festival (out of competition)
In English
99 minutes

Giornate degli Autori is promoted by ANAC and 100autori, with the support of the Fondazione Biennale di Venezia and the Ministry of Culture.

Giornate degli Autori: Award Winners 2025

GIORNATE DEGLI AUTORI DIRECTOR’S AWARD 

   Inside Amir by Amir Azizi

EUROPA CINEMAS LABEL  PEOPLE’S CHOICE AWARD

   Bearcave by Stergios Dinopoulos & Krysianna B. Papadakis

PEOPLE’S CHOICE AWARD (ex aequo)

    Memory by Vladlena Sandu
   A Sad and Beautiful World by Cyril Aris

In addition to dealing with the subject directly (with his previous documentaries playing at the Berlinale in 2010 and Locarno in 2018), Wadimoff has also supported Palestinian filmmakers via his production company Akka Films. It is no surprise, then, he chose to continue exploring these territories to mark his return behind the camera after a teaching stint in Geneva, where he was in charge of the Film department at HEAD, the local art and design school, from 2019 to 2023.

Originally meant to be filmed in the director’s native Switzerland, the project had to be relocated to South Africa because, as per the opening text, it’s one of the few countries in the world where Palestinians from Gaza are granted entry without a visa. Nine refugees who managed to escape the war-torn region gather together in a room where white paint is applied on a black floor to crudely outline Gaza, its streets and neighborhoods, similar to black box theater or Lars von Trier’s films Dogville and Manderlay.

Within this abstract space representing a phantom zone and the lives of people who are akin to ghosts, the nine people – their names are Jawdat Khoudari, Mahmoud Jouda, Adel Altaweel, Haneen Harara, Malak Khadra, Hanaa Eleiwa, Firaz Elshrafi, Eman Shanan and Ghada Alabadla – convene to share their stories. They talk about their past lives, their daily routines, what they’ve lost in recent months, how they wish for their existence to not slip into oblivion. For they, per the title, are still alive (or more correctly, as in the French moniker, living), and want to make sure that doesn’t go unnoticed.

The aesthetic choice made by Wadimoff, with cinematographers Leandro Monti and Camille Cottagnoud conveying the paradox of sincere stories told against a deliberately fake background, is inevitably an acquired taste, and may be off-putting to some. But as we get further into the film’s two-hour running time, which never feels punishing despite the grim subject matter, the heart of the matter emerges beyond the artifice, in a manner that is both intellectually and emotionally impactful.

There’s no footage from Gaza, but the testimony is just as relevant and powerful, delivered within a space that is reflective of the suspended state the people of the region find themselves in, both at home and internationally. Perpetually in flux, their conversations are a stark, compelling reminder of the need to reconnect with our humanity even under the most inhumane circumstances.

Director & Screenwriter: Nicolas Wadimoff
Cast: Jawdat Khoudari, Mahmoud Jouda, Adel Altaweel, Haneen Harara, Malak Khadra, Hanaa Eleiwa, Firaz Elshrafi, Eman Shanan, Ghada Alabadla
Producers: Ketsia Stocker, Nicolas Wadimoff, Nadia Turincev, Omar El Kadi, Ossama Bawardi, May Jabareen
Cinematography: Leandro Monti, Camille Cottagnoud
Music: Dom La Nena
Sound: Carlos Ibanes Diaz, Vuk Vukmanovic, Niels Barletta
Production companies: Akka Films, Easy Riders Films, Philistine Films, RTS Radio Télévision Suisse
World sales: Akka Films
Venue: Venice Film Festival (Giornate degli Autori)
In Arabic
113 minutes

Still revered as a symbol of modern theater a hundred years after her death, “La Divina” is brought to life by a charismatic, gray-haired Valeria Bruni Tedeschi — not as a suffering, ego-wounded diva à la Angelina Jolie’s Maria Callas, but as a caring, independent, mature woman whose intelligence and courage match her emotional faculties. Bowing in Venice competition, it meets modern audiences more than half way with a fascinating viewpoint on a powerful woman.

Embedding her life story in the rise of the emerging Fascist movement adds a great deal of gravitas to the film. It also attempts to set the record straight and show that Eleanora was a free-thinking political liberal, although her death was unjustly co-opted by the Nationalists and Mussolini’s movement for their dark cause. The screenplay by Marcello, Letizia Russo and Guido Silei addresses the backstory, too.

Importantly, the film is punctuated by newly colored archive footage that is almost shockingly lifelike. Silent, accusing images show weary soldiers returning from the front, milling urban crowds, cocky Black Shirts. The unexpected veracity and naturalness of this visual innovation lends the viewer new eyes with which to see the leering faces and haunting locations, while it puts the narrative in a broad historical context.

Though already in her sixties and sporting steel gray hair down to her waist, Eleanora is a tireless traveler. At her side is her gentlewoman companion, Désirée Von Wertheimstein, played by Polish actress Fanni Wrochna. A young Austrian, she is prim and by-the-rules, though with hints of an underground fire. For her Duse is a mother figure who elusively slips out of her protective grasp. Unpleasantly domineering, instead, is Eleanora’s grown daughter Enrietta (Noémie Merlant, Tár), who can’t wait to admit her to the safety of a sanatorium. (Her mother does cough a lot.)

But Eleanora makes her own decisions, thank you. The story begins with her strenuous visit to an Italian military camp and field hospital high in the mountains, arriving by cable car. Her brief salute to the troops is sincere and devoid of nationalist rhetoric. It has been ten years since she gave up the stage and she tells the men, “I don’t know if I’m an actress”, though “poetry is more powerful than arms.”

While she is at the camp, a small plane appears overhead and a murmur rises up. It is Gabriele D’Annunzio, the famous Futurist avant-garde poet, who has embraced a life of action and violence, as per the Futurist creed of modernism at all cost. He and Duse broke off a long romantic relationship in 1904, but still he drops a gift addressed to her from his plane. She hastily unloads the scarf on her entourage. The implication is she’s not that into him anymore, particularly as he has extolled the rise of Fascism and is a figurehead in the new Italy.

But economic reversals due to the war change many plans. To pay her debts, Eleanora agrees to go back to the stage and star in Ibsen’s The Lady from the Sea. Opening night at La Scala is a triumph and the celebrities in the audience include Sarah Bernhardt, who arrives nonchalantly with her wooden leg. Later, Sarah reminds her old friend Eleanora that a world catastrophe has occurred and the theater must adapt and change its focus. Eleanora tends to agree.

This leads to the financial disaster of her next play, Hecube in the Trenches, a Futurist cliché poorly written by a pompous playwright and produced on a shoestring using the last of Duse’s money. It is heckled on opening night and closes immediately.

Sinking under huge debts, Eleanora finally turns to her old flame D’Annunzio for help. He is now an orator for the Fascists and she believes he will put in a good word for her with the powers that be. So when she is summoned to appear before Benito Mussolini himself, and his government pays all her debts and grants her a pension, she lays it to the poet’s good offices. But she is deceived. In a final face-to-face with the Futurist, who is now very old and sick, two larger-than-life figures exchange their last words in a touching farewell.

The film is full of enjoyable performances by a cast that goes far beyond the standard for period pieces, notably Fausto Russo Alesi’s nuanced wit as D’Annunzio and Vincenzo Pirrotta in the Mussolini cameo. But as is only appropriate, Bruni Tedeschi gives the knockout performance. She inhabits the velvet cloaks of Duse with natural class, and her occasional spacy idealism is a good match for La Divina’s eccentricity.

Tech work is at a high level throughout as the story roams the northeast of Italy, through gloomy mountain churches with damaged frescoes to the romantic villa on a Venice canal where Eleanora and Désirée spend the closing months.

Director: Pietro Marcello
Screenplay: Letizia Russo, Guido Silei, Pietro Marcello
Cast: Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, Fanni Wrochna, Noémie Merlant, Fausto Russo Alesi, Edoardo Sorgente, Vincenzo Nemolato, with the participation of Noémie Lvovsky
Producers:  Carlo Degli Esposti, Nicola Serra, Marco Grifoni, Benedetta Cappon
Cinematography: Marco Graziaplena
Editing: Fabrizio Federico, Cristiano Travaglioli, Alessio Franco, Luca Carrera
Production design: Gaspare De Pascali
Costume design: Ursula Patzak
Music: Marco Messina, Sacha Ricci, Fabrizio Elvetico
Sound: Denny De Angelis, Federico Cabula, Alessandro Feletti
Production companies: Palomar – a Mediawan company, Avventurosa, Rai Cinema, PiperFilm, Ad Vitam Films, Berta Film
World Sales: The Match Factory
Venue: Venice Film Festival (Competition)
In Italian
125 minutes

The film, which bowed in competition at the Venice Film Festival, furthers the director’s exploration of mixing fictional drama with reality to obtain the greatest emotional and dramatic effect. Her award-winning 2023 film Four Daughters broke exciting new ground in merging documentary and fiction to shine light on family dynamics and the political radicalization of two sisters, mixing the real protagonists with actors.

The new film goes even further, creating 90 solid minutes of incredible tension around the real voice of six-year-old Hind Rajab Hamada, recorded during an extended phone call with the Palestinian Red Crescent Society in Ramallah, West Bank. This authentic call is visually represented as a long bouncing line across the screen, with which the helpless staff (all actors) interact in a heart-breaking conversation.
The date is Jan. 29, 2024 and Hind is traveling in a car with her aunt and uncle and their four children, who are fleeing from their home in Gaza City. They are near a gas station when an Israeli tank appears and opens fire on them, riddling the car with bullets and killing everyone except Hind and her teenage cousin Layan, who later also dies.

Mahdi (Motaz Malhees), who is manning the phones in Ramallah, takes Layan’s call begging for help. Gunshots can be heard in the background. He is instantly involved in the drama taking place in northern Gaza – in fact, as a hair-trigger hothead prone to grabbing other people’s phones and insulting their official contacts, he’s far too emotional to be of much help. Rana (Saja Kilani) takes over with a more maternal approach, even reciting prayers with the little girl, but she can’t forget Hind is trapped in a car with the bloody bodies of her family.

While Rana talks, Mahdi hysterically vents his frustrations on Omar (Amer Hlehel), the cool head who has to coordinate a safe passage for an ambulance and its rescue team of paramedics to save the little girl. The bureaucracy he is facing is formidable. While their supervisor Nisreem (Clara Khoury) tries to calm down their shouting matches, Rana slowly collapses from the emotional strain of talking to the frightened little girl, whose fate looks darker with each minute that passes. She screams that a tank is approaching the car head-on…

Shooting in a single, cramped location – the communicating rooms of the emergency center – to rack up the tension, Ben Hania develops the dialogue along essential lines and concentrates the camera on close-ups of the actors’ faces. Sometimes the staff’s emotional energy is too raw to accept, leaving the audience to defend itself against the crushing weight of their despair. Hind is just one human life, but she stands in for the entire genocide that is taking place in front of our eyes.

Director, screenplay: Kaouther Ben Hania
Cast: Saja Kilani, Motaz Malhees, Clara Khoury, Amer Hlehel
Producers: Nadim Cheikhrouha, James Wilson, Odessa Rae
Cinematography: Juan Sarmiento G.
Editing: Qutaiba Barhamji, Maxime Mathis, Kaouther Ben Hania
Production design: Bassem Marzouk
Costume design: Khadija Zeggai
Music: Amine Bouhafa
Sound: Amal Attia, Elias Boughedir, Gwennolé LeBorgne, Marion Papinot, Lars Ginzel
Production companies: Mime Films & Tanit Films, JW Films, RaeFilm Studios
World Sales: The Party Film Sales
Venue: Venice Film Festival (Competition)
In Arabic
90 minutes

For every Vive L’Amour, which bows at the Venice Classics programme on September 3, there’s a The Love in Okinawa. Set in the titular Japanese archipelago and Taiwan, the romance drama about a young, ill-fated couple falling foul of their warring patriarchs was one of the last technicolor Hokkien-language films before mainstream Mandarin-language cinema took over the island’s cinemas in the 1970s. Directed by Lin Fu-ti, the film was considered lost until San Francisco theatre owner Frank Lee called the institute about some reels he discovered in his basement.

“Lee’s family has operated cinemas in Chinatowns across major North American cities,” explained Arthur Chu, chairman of the institute, to The Film Verdict. “Catering to a largely Chinese-speaking audience, they regularly travelled to Taiwan and Hong Kong in the 1960s and 1970s to acquire 35mm prints for theatrical screenings. As digital projection eventually replaced film, hundreds of reels were left stored under the theater’s narrow stage space.

“Among the reels, [our] archivists were astonished to find several important Taiwanese films previously uncatalogued by the institute and presumed lost – including The Love in Okinawa and Sunset Over the Horizon,” the latter being another Japanese-Taiwanese co-production that director Lin Fu-ti shot over the same period in the islands. Ironically, only Lee’s Mandarin-dubbed print of Okinawa survived – and the restored version of the film was screened at the institute in 2023 with the 89-year-old director in attendance.

That screening marked the 10th anniversary of the “Taiwan Classic Film Digital Restoration and Value-Added Utilization Project”, a government-backed initiative aimed at ensuring the preservation of Taiwan’s film heritage “in a long-term and systematic manner”, Chu said. “In the past, the concept of film preservation was rarely prioritized in Taiwan, resulting in many local films becoming lost to time, known only through scattered written records.”

Today, Taiwan is perhaps the most active among its regional counterparts in terms of the preservation, restoration and promotion of a national film heritage in all its forms and sizes. The screenings of the revived Vive L’Amour in Venice was just the latest of the institute’s international presentations of its diverse slate this year. In April, the Far East Film Festival hosted three institute-backed restorations of late 1960s to early 1970s films by the Rome-educated critic-turned-filmmaker Pai Ching-jui; in July, the New York Asian Film Festival hosted Gorgeous, a bawdy social satire financed by wuxia-actor-turned-impresario Hsu Feng and directed by Chang Mei-chun. Last month, the institute unfurled a ten-film programme at Osaka Expo about the history of Taiwanese cinema, with each of the screenings preceded by a teaser trailer of the restoration of Tracing to Expo ’70, a film shot in the last edition of the Osaka event 55 years ago.

“Teruoka Sozo, the programming director of the Osaka Asian Film Festival, first came across Tracing to Expo ’70 in the early 2000s while browsing 16mm prints and VHS tapes of Taiwanese films in Tokyo,” Chu said. “The film’s vivid spectacle and star power left a lasting impression. Decades later, during Filmart in Hong Kong, the film resurfaced in conversation, sparking Sozo’s proposal to TFAI: could this hidden gem be restored in time for Expo 2025’s return to Osaka? A rare print was soon uncovered in the archive, and by mid-year, TFAI had launched a full-scale digital restoration.”

On August 20, the institute’s restoration of the Italy-trained Hsu Chin-liang’s 1979 youth drama The Fellow Who Rejected College premiered in Singapore. Based on a then best-selling novel about a young elite student who gave up the opportunity to attend university because he refused to conform to norms of public examinations, the film was considered the harbinger of the wave of high-school-set films appearing in Taiwan in the 1980s. (The film was co-written by Wu Nien-jin, the author-actor who would later become central to the New Taiwan Cinema movement.)

The president of the Singapore Film Society, Kenneth Tan, mentioned that he had watched The Fellow Who Rejected College as many as 43 times in cinemas when he was a junior high school student in Singapore,” Chu said. “The film deeply resonated with his own experience of the pressures of academic examinations. Moved by this connection, he personally reached out to the director and expressed the hope that TFAI could restore the film.”

Chu considers the restoration initiative goes beyond merely canonisation. “What is being restired is not just the image on film, but the soul and memory of an entire era,” he said, adding that the institute “does not insist on 4K restoration as the sole standard”.

“Decisions must take into account a film’s historical significance, as well as its aesthetic and artistic value, while also assessing its relevance in today’s society and film industry,” he continued.

“More meaningful is that these films carry Taiwan’s history, culture, and everyday experiences. When international audiences watch them, they’re entering a part of Taiwan’s collective memory, seeing our society through the lens of cinema.

“In that sense, restoration is also a form of cultural exchange. The restoration projects are really about reintroducing Taiwanese cinema to the world. It shows that our film history is not limited to just one movement, like the Taiwan New Cinema, but that it spans many decades, full of creativity, diversity, and remarkable stories worth sharing internationally.”

Hauser’s fourth feature has some of the gaucheness we might expect from a 24-year-old one-man film crew with scant resources and limited experience. There are plot holes, ragged edges and stilted performances here. But they scarcely matter when the end result is so formally inventive, tearing up cinematic conventions, keeping us on our toes with a feast of images and ideas. This week, Memory of Princess Mumbi becomes the first Kenyan production ever to world premiere in the Venice Days sidebar, with a North American debut to follow soon in Toronto. If Hauser can sustain this level of creative dynamism, he is clearly a serious talent to watch.

Memory of Princess Mumbi crams a lot of plots, subplots and textural layers into its post-modern patchwork narrative, including passages of improvised dialogue, plus Hauser even playing an off-screen version of himself in the early scenes. But at its core lies an old-fashioned fairy-tale romance between star-crossed lovers. The setting is the African coastal state of Umata at the end of the 21st century, two decades after a global war in which traditionalist forces triumphed, promptly banning the digital technology that was allegedly causing widespread depression. Africa has since reverted to a continent of ancient empires run by despotic monarchs. Why this has happened is not entirely clear, but it makes for some great world-building visuals.

A cocky young film-maker from Europe, Kuve (Ibrahim Joseph) is in Umata trying to make a documentary which proves the citizens are still depressed, despite the new political climate. He recruits a local actress, the spirited Mumbi (a luminous Shandra Apondi), to help present his film. Even though Mumbi challenges Kuve’s simplistic, subjective narrative, a romance sparks between them. But Mumbi’s hand in marriage has already been promised to Prince Prince (Samson Waithaka), the powerful ruler of a neighbouring kingdom. After briefly going on the run in Europe, she resigns herself to her royal destiny, leaving Kuve heartbroken. When their paths next cross, six years later, he is a famous film-maker and she a princess. But their old chemistry still sizzles, leading to tension and tragedy on the set of Kuve’s latest blockbuster.

On a purely visual level, Memory of Princess Mumbi looks consistently stunning, cramming blockbuster-level production design into an 80-minute low-budget feature. Hauser uses AI software extensively here but also more antique methods like rotoscoping, compositing and green screen. Blending real Kenyan locations with digital effects, the cityscapes and coastal villages are particularly strong, gravity-defying mega-structures that combine old, new and future elements into dazzling fantasy architecture. We are not in Wakanda any more, Toto.

Hauser has fun with smaller design elements too, including the grammar of cinema itself, pre-magining fictional future blockbusters complete with accompanying awards ceremonies, posters and publicity materials. The meticulous level of detail, colour and symmetry here frequently recalls Wes Anderson at his most playful.

For all its bouncy pace and glossy surface sheen, Memory of Princess Mumbi has serious points to make about the post-colonial cinematic gaze, unreliable narrators, human creativity vs digital simulation, and more. As a mixed-heritage film-maker from Switzerland, Hauser is particularly wary of cliched Eurocentric takes on Africa. Indeed, he rejects his film being labelled “Afrofuturism”, arguing this term was imposed on the continent by outsiders.

In a nicely ironic counterpoint to his extensive use of AI effects, Hauser stages a recurring debate between his main protagonists about the ethics of deploying this technology in film-making. Mumbi takes a firm line, chastising Kuve for using AI to make interviewees look more depressed, purely to suit his subjective narrative, and for handing over his creative decision-making to autonomous editing software. Hauser’s messaging is ambivalent here, because AI is new and its long-term effects unclear, but it is refreshing to see a young film-maker weighing up its pros and cons, challenges and contradictions in such a creative way.

On a deeper thematic level, Memory of Princess Mumbi is also an act of personal catharsis for Hauser, a memorial of sorts for his 14-year-old brother Charles, who died in a motorcycle accident before this project was born. The director headed to Kenya to recuperate, where his meditations on how we choose to remember lost loved ones began to percolate into an embryonic screenplay about bereavement and depression, joy and celebration. This delirious fever-dream of a film ends with a dedication to Charles.

Director, screenwriter, cinematography, editing, music, producer, production design: Damien Hauser
Cast: Shandra Apondi, Ibrahim Joseph, Samson Waithaka, Michael Garama, Damien Hauser
Sound: Nikola Medic
Co-producers: Kaleem Aftab, Shandra Apondi
Production companies: Out of My Mind Films (Kenya), Hauserfilm (Switzerland)
World sales: Paradise City, Paris
Venue: Venice Film Festival (Venice Days)
In English
80 minutes 

The intensity of the story brings to mind the drastic solutions proposed in the Cold War thriller Fail Safe, filmed in 1964 by Sidney Lumet and again in 2000 by Stephen Frears. It posits a group of American bombers being accidentally deployed to Moscow, and unable to be recalled in time to stop a nuclear war. In an opening title, Bigelow states that at the end of the Cold War, nuclear arsenals were expected to diminish. Far from it.

The Netflix release received the full honor of a competition screening in Venice, the festival that launched Bigelow’s early Academy Award-winning hit set during the Iraq war, The Hurt Locker, in 2008. With Zero Dark Thirty (2012) which dramatized the successful US operation to find and kill Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, Bigelow’s new film fits neatly into an American war trilogy, one that ends in the Apocalypse. Or does it?

If there is a weak link in this emotion-drenched story, which screenwriter Noah Oppenheim (Jackie) tells three times from different POVs in classic Rashomon fashion, it is the shocker of an ending. Few will see it coming, some will accept its appropriateness, but many will dispute this radical choice. More cannot be said except that it is a matter of taste.

A less controversial narrative decision is to introduce and delineate a wide variety of characters and let each shine in turn for about ten minutes. In the first account of the disaster that happens one fine morning in America, the efficient Olivia Walker (Rebecca Ferguson) kisses her husband and feverish young son goodbye to make her way to a high-tech operations room, where she is second in command. Her defining trait is being calm under fire, which is useful when the instruments suddenly announce a nuclear strike is in progress. As soon becomes clear, the missile, whose origin is unknown, is not a fluke or an error but a real threat. In a structure that loves acronyms, DEFCON 2 – high alert – is declared.

Across the country, other situation rooms of the army, air force and marines go on high alert from Fort Greely, Alaska to Nebraska. A tall, square-jawed pilot makes a manly joke as he suits up for his very special mission in a B-2 Ghost bomber, suggesting the film could be headed for a Dr. Strangelove-type ending.

If the military personnel are all young and excitable, the old-timers are in denial; but everyone wants to warn their families to flee. Two missiles are launched to intercept the invader – and at the last minute both fail to deploy. “Is this what we get for 50 billion dollars?” rants the head of the Pentagon. “A bullet hitting a bullet,” shrugs a staff member. Now DEFCON 1 – nuclear war imminent – is declared. As the options prove to be nonexistent (“There is no Plan B”), the Secret Service starts to selectively evacuate personnel to nuclear shelters like the Pentagon’s Raven Rock nuclear bunker, leaving everybody else to survive on their own. And the buck about what to do stops at the President.

At a certain point, the stunned operatives get POTUS on the phone. Imagine him as you will: for two-thirds of the film he is no more than an angry black screen on a video call. Only when the story-telling reaches its third round does Idris Elba materialize as an Obama-style president who, in a total quandary as the minutes tick away, consults his smart, cool wife who appears surrounded by elephants on some kind of an African safari.

Casting Elba is a good way to sweep away doubts that the current Administration is behind all the technical glitches and flashes of incompetence that paralyze a prompt response. Instead the point seems to be that systems fail and unscripted emergencies come along; key decision-makers fall sick and the President of the United States is left taking advice from 30-year-old deputies.

One of these is a clean-cut military aid who carries around the nuclear football with the authentication codes and response options in case of nuclear emergency. In a fascinating scene aboard Air Force One, the young aid shows the Commander-in-Chief a literal menu of three levels of strikebacks, referring to them as “rare, medium and well-done”.

As the countdown brings the city of Chicago closer to its fiery end, with a death toll of 10 million the estimated loss of life, composer Volker Bertelmann’s short burst of pulsating notes ramps up the horror and tension while Barry Ackroyd’s cinematography becomes starker. Where will it all end? Are there really no options left? These are the important questions that are posed and left to the audience to answer.

Director: Kathryn Bigelow
Screenplay: Noah Oppenheim
Cast: Idris Elba, Rebecca Ferguson, Gabriel Basso, Jared Harris, Tracy Letts, Anthony Ramos, Moses Ingram, Jonah Hauer-King, Greta Lee, Jason Clarke
Producers: Kathryn Bigelow, Greg Shapiro, Noah Oppenheim
Cinematography: Barry Ackroyd
Editing: Kirk Baxter
Production design: Jeremy Hindle
Costume design: Sarah Edwards
Music: Volker Bertelmann
Sound: Paul N.J. Ottoson
Production companies: First Light Pictures, Kingsgate Films, Prologue Entertainment
International distribution: Netflix
Venue: Venice Film Festival (Competition)
In English
112 minutes

The story takes place in a rural community in Switzerland, right in the middle of World War II. While the country is officially neutral on the military front, the local population has no major qualms about delivering Jews to the surrounding German troops, while hypocritically agreeing with the pastor’s calls for empathy and kindness. It is in this context that the young Emma (Lila Gueneau) is up for an acknowledgement for her pious behavior.

Things change dramatically when a seemingly harmless interaction with one Louis (Cyril Metzger, previously seen in Golden Lion winner Happening) turns into sexual assault, her hands desperately clinging to the grass as she hopes for the ordeal to be over as quickly as possible. Unfortunately for her, the rape leaves a mark in the form of pregnancy, leading to the semi-urgent decision to strike up a relationship with her friend Paul (the Belgian former child actor Thomas Doret, who starred in the Dardennes’ The Kid with a Bike).

She thinks she will eventually grow to love him, but things get more complicated than expected, as her new husband opposes the idea of her doing any work at all, including the chores she used to carry out for the pastor. Alone within her own household, and with few allies (her own mother is established early on as a negative presence in the community), Emma decides to carve out her own path, no matter the cost.

Gueneau’s performance, measured in her handling of pained silence and understated dignity, is the revelatory emotional centerpiece of the film, the main building block from which Sgualdo derives a handsomely mounted project set in the past but very much speaking to the present. It’s a powerful piece of acting that more than makes up for a lack of big swings on the directorial side, as everything is carefully calibrated to get the message across and tell a story that, per the director, feels very relevant today as women’s rights are getting trampled on even in countries that have supposedly embraced progressive values.

Much like its protagonist, Silent Rebellion presents a somewhat timid or modest countenance, before embarking on a steadily paced journey that is sometimes cinematically conventional but always filled with sincerity and passion, primarily through the strong acting ensemble which revolves heavily and solidly around the younger cast, although Claire Denis regular Grégoire Colin manages to get room to shine among the adults. Quiet demeanors abound, but as a calling card for Sgualdo’s career in feature filmmaking, it knows when to get just about loud enough.

Director: Marie-Elsa Sgualdo
Screenwriters: Nadine Lamari, Marie-Elsa Sgualdo
Cast: Lila Gueneau, Grégoire Colin, Thomas Doret, Aurélia Petit, Sandrine Blancke, Sasha Gravat Harsch, Tamara Semelet, Cyril Metzger, Lievke Bartel, Aurelien Patouillard, Etienne Fague
Producers: Elena Tatti, Nicolas Wittwer, Julie Esparbes, Emmanuelle Latourrette, Fabrice Préel-Cléach
Cinematography: Benoît Dervaux
Production design: Sara B. Weingart
Costume design: Geneviève Maulini
Music: Nicolas Rabaeus
Sound: Xavier Lavorel, Henry Sims
Production companies: Box Productions, Hélicotronic, Offshore, RTS Radio Télévision Suisse
World sales: Salaud Morisset
Venue: Venice Film Festival (Venezia Spotlight)
In French
96 minutes

As per the title, the plot revolves around a full school year. Specifically, the last year of high school for a group of students in Trieste. This established community has to welcome a new member: Fredrika “Fred” Sjöberg (Stella Wendick), who has moved to Italy from Sweden on account of her father’s line of work. Her shy demeanor and the initial language barrier make it hard for her to integrate at first, and some bullying occurs. Over time, though, she manages to bond with three people in particular, all boys: Giacomo Antero (Giacomo Covi), Pietro Pasini (Pietro Giustolisi) and Samuel Mitis (Samuel Volturno). Will their friendship – or perhaps something more – get them all the way to admission to the final exams?

Samani goes for a light-hearted approach filled with empathy, which immediately allows the characters to endear themselves to the viewer and come across as fully developed protagonists and not clichéd movie teenagers, even when the dialogue invokes some low-brow, common denominator stuff (given Fred’s origin, the inevitable dirty joke Italians like to tell with Stockholm as the punchline is dispensed with early on). Soon enough, it all feels very lived-in and real, and one almost feels like joining this cheerful foursome on one of their regular trips to the most popular hangout in town, affectionately known as Bar Merda (“shit”).

Key to the film’s success is the casting of the four youths, and the director truly struck gold with Wendick, Covi, Giustolisi and Volturno, all of whom are making their film debuts (or, as the Italian-language opening credits say, “for the first time on the screen”, a mention they all share in a single title card to highlight their strength as a unit). They give naturalistic performances (the guys in particular get to use their real accents rather than “proper” Italian diction, the cultural specificity adding to the soul of each character) and provide a solid emotional roadmap all the way up to the joyfully melancholic resolution.

Visually, A Year of School is perhaps less impressive than Small Body, which took its female lead on a physical and spiritual journey across formally enchanting landscapes, but the simplicity Samani evokes with the help of cinematographer Inès Tabarin is, much like the acting, a deceptively straightforward gateway. As the story progresses, the director finds just enough room for small yet elegant touches that enrich the microcosm she’s dealing with and make that world undeniably her own, albeit with all the classic ingredients that will make it recognizable and relatable for everyone. It’s a simpler project, but one that never takes the easy way out.

Director: Laura Samani
Screenwriters: Laura Samani, Elisa Dondi
Cast: Stella Wendick, Giacomo Covi, Pietro Giustolisi, Samuel Volturno, Magnus Krepper, Silvia Gallerano
Producers: Nadia Trevisan, Alberto Fasulo, Thomas Lambert
Cinematography: Inès Tabarin
Costume design: Loredana Buscemi
Sound: Luca Bertolin, Danilo Romancino, Riccardo Spagnol, Vincent Arnardi
Production companies: Nefertiti Film, Rai Cinema, Tomsa Films, Arte France Cinéma
World sales: Rai Cinema
Venue: Venice Film Festival (Orizzonti)
In Italian, Swedish, English
102 minutes

The Islamic revolution of 1979 had a shock effect on lran, changing civil society overnight and spurring many critics of the new regime, who feared for their life and liberty, to immigrate to the West. In Past Present Continuous, the unseen 20-year-old protagonist Maryam has “done nothing” but align herself with a movement – and she has seen friends and fellow students jailed or executed for less.

Working within the strict confines of a middle-class home in Tehran, the filmmakers weave what might be called a “typical” story of a family torn apart by the revolution, using sophisticated visual effects, split screens, an offscreen narrator and recurring symbolic images. Yet despite the distanced feeling these devices convey, the viewer can feel the anguish and loneliness of Maryam, the unseen character at the center of an incredible attempt to be in two places at once.

Maryam lives and teaches in the U.S.; in fact she gets her American citizenship along with hundreds of other candidates in a startling scene created out of archive footage. But in all the years since her parents paid to have her smuggled into Turkey across the mountains, in the middle of a herd of sheep, they have only been able to get a visa to meet each other once. Now Maryam has convinced the couple to set up an army of cameras around the house and garden, so she has constant access to the old folks and what they are doing. Basically she spies on them day and night, with the excuse that she is making sure the doors are locked, the gas off, their meds taken on time. It actually looks more like the surveillance in a maximum security prison, and it doesn’t solve Maryam’s problem. Her anxiety spikes when the Internet is blocked in Iran, as often happens when protest marches need to be kept hidden from the world.

Ahmadvand and Khosrovani describe with great conviction the pain of separation from families and the obsessive longing of those who left the country, only to discover later it was a permanent parting. They can never go back. Recurrent images of a white dove beating its wings in overlaid images visually renders the idea of migration. The poetic interludes are heavy with symbolism that will appeal to some viewers more than others.

The film is beautifully shot by D.P. Mohamad Hadadi, who places a fixed camera high on the living room wall to give Maryam the main image of her parents lives as they shuffle (and in one scene, dance) around the apartment. Since there is no sound of them talking, we don’t know how much their solitude weighs on them. But it certainly weighs on their daughter. Christophe Rezai’s wistful music score underlines her nostalgia for the home she grew up in – a house that literally speaks to her across time and space, in her memory and dreams.

Directors, screenplay: Morteza Ahmadvand, Firouzeh Khosrovani
Producers: Firouzeh Khosrovani, Fabien Greenberg, Bard Kjoge Ronning, Andre Segre, Giulia Campagna
Cinematography: Mohamad Hadadi
Editing: Solmaz Effekhari
Music: Christophe Rezai
Sound: Ensieh Maleki
Production companies: Fifi Films, Antipode Films, Zalab Film in association with Rai Cinema
World Sales: Taskovski Films
Venue: Venice Film Festival (Giornate degli Autori)
In Farsi
80 minutes

Taking as its pretext the recent deaths of its two protagonists, the film is a meditation on life and death, on legacy and letting go. The film opens with a moody prologue, narrated by screenwriter Eva H.D., in which Anthi (Jessie Buckley) and Rateb (Josef Akiki) both live out their final hours. Each outsiders in their own way, they emerge onto the streets of Athens the next morning to find it transformed into a hypnagogic afterlife, where the pavements are filled with the dearly departed and they must wrestle with their own sense of legacy and our innate desire not to be forgotten. How to Shoot a Ghost premieres out of competition at this year’s Venice Film Festival.

Rateb was a translator working on a new translation of Thucydides, while Anthi was a photographer. Now, they are spirits, reckoning with their lives and mistakes and what it means to be remembered. Anthi takes polaroids of the other ghosts she encounters, and Kaufman and his editors Robert Franzen and Jon Daniel interject into the proceedings with splices of archival footage, creating a kind of trajectory into which we pass from tangible subject to flickers of light on celluloid. Rateb reflects on his own personal history and what he has left behind, while he walks around a hometown in which ancient history is ever present, and the dialogue between then and now is a constant.

All of this takes places in a fragmentary way, the pair come together and drift through this dreamscape, their conversations and musing only heard as voiceover and intermingled with Eva H.D.’s omniscient narrator. Michal Dymek photography emphasises the unreality, his camera hovering to hold the characters in close-up or the lens curving and distorting the image to send the rest of the world into a blur. In many cultures the act of remembrance is a act of service to those beyond the mortal realm – to lessen their time in purgatory, to lengthen their time in paradise. In How to Shoot a Ghost, there is something peaceful in allowing it all to slip away.

Director: Charlie Kaufman
Cast: Jessie Buckley, Josef Akiki, Eva H.D.
Screenplay: Eva H.D.
Producers: Isabelle DeLuce, Emily McCann Lesser
Cinematography: Michal Dymek
Editing: Robert Franzen, Jon Daniel
Sound: Lew Goldtsein
Music: Ella van der Woudei
Production design: Kim Jennings
Production companies: Unmade, Soft Focus Films, Monarch Kaleidoscope, Green Olive Films, Kanopy in association with Nightjar Films, Liaison Pictures with the support of Onassis Stegi with the participation of Athens Film Office, Municipality of Athens
Venue: Venice Film Festival (Out of Competition – Shorts)
In English
27 minutes

Read more of our short film coverage over at Verdict Shorts

Featuring an all-singing, all-dancing ensemble cast headed by Amanda Seyfried, this emphatically artisan project is Fastvold’s poetic love letter to the founder of the Shaker movement, a now near-extinct Christian sect who nevertheless left behind a legacy of proto-feminist progressive values, psalm-like devotional songs and finely crafted DIY design.

Fastvold typically works in close collaboration with her American film-maker husband Brady Corbet, who shares script and second unit directing credits here. Indeed, she shot The Testament of Ann Lee soon after Corbet competed his period epic The Brutalist (2024), using some of the same cast, crew and Hungarian locations. Corbet’s operatic architectural saga world premiered in Venice a year ago, earning rapturous notices that helped propel it to multiple Oscar-winning critical and commercial success. Twelve months later, Fastvold is back on the Lido with her own project, slightly less grandiose but similarly inventive in form and flavour.

Speculative and highly stylised, but firmly rooted in real people and events, The Testament of Ann Lee is the kind of defiantly off-beat auteur work that seems sure to divide critics – indeed, there were walk-outs and baffled reactions at the Venice press screening. The long runtime sags a little in places, particularity during the latter half, while some of the non-British cast members struggle with their specifically regional English accents. Even so, this is strong-voiced, admirably ambitious film-making that rewards patient viewers with fiercely committed performances, great visual finesse and superbly staged musical numbers.

Artfully framed as a series of literary chapters, with sporadic voice-over narration by one of Lee’s disciples (Thomasina McKenzie). The Testament of Ann Lee opens with the birth of the Shaker religious movement in the northern English industrial city of Manchester in the mid 18th century. More formally known as The United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing, this millenarian Christian sect was a radical breakaway offshoot from the Quakers, with Lee as its founder and charismatic leader.

The group soon earns its nickname the “Shaking Quakers” because of their ecstatic convulsions during worship, which Lee believes is a way of cleansing away sin. Fastvold and her team make these orgiastic rituals a central driving force of the drama with a series of brilliantly choreographed, chest-thumping song-and-dance number that power the plot forward. Credit is due here to choreographer Celia Rowlson-Hall, who previously worked on Corbet’s unorthodox pop-diva drama Vox Lux (2018).

The Shakers share a progressive commitment to pacifism, gender equality and opposition to slavery with the Quakers. But Lee take a much harder line against “lustful gratification of the flesh”, preaching that celibacy is the only way to earn divine grace. She has four children, but all die very young, a wounding personal loss which leads her to conclude God is punishing her for having sex with her husband Abraham (a colourless Christopher Abbott). Fastvold shoots several of these childbirth scenes as tragic horror tableaux, but she also shows Lee’s sex life with Abraham as a joyless obligation with an intriguing BDSM dimension. Before long, she is relaying messages directly from the Big Guy upstairs that “fornication” is the root of all evil,

Fleeing petty bureaucratic persecution in Britain, Lee and her preacher brother William (a brooding Lewis Pullman) lead a small band of followers across the Atlantic to the United States, setting up their first commune-style base in upstate New York. Despite defections by sexually frustrated members, including Abraham, plus hostility from the authorities, wary of the group’s pacifist neutrality in America’s Revolutionary War, Lee presses on with evangelical zeal, declaring herself the second coming of Jesus in female form. Along the way she faces jail, denunciation as a witch, and brutal misogynistic violence. Yet the Shakers endure, gradually converting thousands of new followers and establishing multiple communities.

Music is the engine of The Testament of Anne Lee, ever present and deeply woven into the film’s fabric. Regular Fastvold/Corbet composer Daniel Blumberg’s contemporary classical score is a densely layered electro-orchestral tapestry of percussive thumps, nerve-jangling strings and airy woodwind while the songs themselves set the lyrics from genuine antique Shaker spirituals to Blumberg’s avant-folk arrangements. Most are performed to camera by the cast in solo or choral mode, but with guest vocals in the mix from left-field luminaries including Scottish free jazz singer Maggie Nicols and Alan Sparhawk of US indie-rock trio Low. Tastes will vary but these are exquisitely crafted songs of faith and devotion, far removed from standard film musical fare

A kinetic whirlwind on screen, Seyfried shines as both lead singer and dancer on several numbers. She has half-jokingly called her vocal approach here “anti-singing” because it edges into more experimental, highly physical performance art at times. But she can deliver more traditional showtune-style numbers with conviction too, as she proved on Les Miserables (2012) and the Mamma Mia! films. She also pulls off a rare feat for an American by mastering Lee’s Manchester accent to a high degree, a skill apparently honed by watching online clips of British actress Maxine Peake, a native of nearby Bolton.

The Testament of Ann Lee could have been played as a tragic rise-and-fall melodrama, a cautionary study of messianic egotism, or even an arch musical parody of fringe religion in the vein of The Book of Mormon. But Fastvold delivers her unorthodox passion play with an admirably straight face, celebrating Lee’s legacy as an empowering, trailblazing female leader without sanitising her into a saint. Though not religious herself, the low-budget indie director has claimed she identifies closely with Lee’s stubborn self-belief, creating an entire queendom in the face of hardship and hostility.

The final credits are peppered with striking statistics about the Shakers, who have declined from an 18th century peak population of 6000 to just two today. It seems enforced chastity was not such a smart policy in the long run. The label lives on mainly as a byword for functionally beautiful kitchen and furniture design, which Fastvold dutifully incorporates into the film’s rich visual tableaux. Some scenes were shot at a real Shaker community, now preserved as a heritage tourist site.

Director: Mona Fastvold
Screenplay: Mona Fastvold, Brady Corbet
Cast:Amanda Seyfried, Thomasin McKenzie, Lewis Pullman, Stacy Martin, Tim Blake Nelson, Christopher Abbott, Matthew Beard, Scott Handy, Jamie Bogyo, Viola Prettejohn, David Cale
Cinematography: William Rexer
Editing: Sofia Subercaseaux
Production designer: Samuel Bader
Costume designer: Ma?gorzata Karpiuk
Music: Daniel Blumberg
Choreography: Celia Rowlson-Hall
Producers: Andrew Morrison, Joshua Horsfield, Viktória Petrányi
Production companies: Kaplan Morrison (US), Intake Films (UK), Proton Cinema (Hungary)
World sales: Charades
Venue: Venice Film Festival (Competition)
In English
130 minutes

Based on a novel based on reality, director Olivier Assayas and his co-screenwriter Emmanuel Carrère mix fiction and history freely, beginning with the over-used framing device of an American journalist on a visit to Moscow in 2019, who becomes privy to all manner of state secrets. The fact that the dialogue is in English in a variety of accents presents the viewer with one more barrier to the suspension of disbelief.

Despite these annoyances, it marks a change of pace for Assayas after such diverse films as Personal Shopper and Suspended Time and offers an original approach to talking about the Russian Federation. The tale of oligarchs, money and power should exert a strong fascination for Russophiles, with crossover interest for those obsessed with present-day politics and the influence that cynically manipulated media have on public opinion. Taking the audience behind the scenes of international intrigue and world events, the film could well find niche audiences after its bow in Venice competition.

Though retired from politics as the film begins, Vadim must still have his ear to the ground, because he becomes immediately aware of the American writer (Jeffrey Wright) who has turned up in snowy Moscow. Without hesitation, he invites him to his magnificent house in the woods to tell him his life story and get a lifetime of shameless fraud and corruption off his chest.

Like almost everyone in the Soviet Union, the Barandov family lived on the edge of poverty. But the 1990’s ushered in sweeping changes embodied in Mikhail Gorbachev leading the Communist Party to an era of reforms and personal freedoms previously unheard of. This is illustrated in a cringe-worthy wild party full of nudity, gay sex and an outdated rock band. It is where Vadim, with his soft voice, cherubic baby face and Beach Boys haircut first meets the glamorous, extroverted Ksenia (Alice Vikander), who weaves in and out of his life as the film goes on. She joins his experimental theater company, but he confides that he is tired of being a writer who witnesses reality without being able to influence it.

After he talks to his fast-lane capitalist friends Dimitry Sidorov (Tom Sturidge) and Boris Berezovsky (Will Keen), Vadim’s ambitions mature. Berezovsky introduces him to the head of the KGB (then called the FSB), Vladimir Putin, and Vadim impresses the spy master with a basic analogy: post-Soviet society is equal and men live “horizontally”, while what the people really want is a strong leader who will impose “verticality”. It’s enough for Putin to invite the young strategist to work for him exclusively. In short order he is elected Secretary of the Security Council of Russia, Prime Minister in August 1999, and president in May 2000.

Though a lot happens during these years, events are only cursorily explored, like the crises that Putin overcomes thanks to Vadim’s Machiavellian machinations: the war in Chechnya, terrorist explosions in the Moscow suburbs, the winter Olympics in Sochi, the annexation of Crimea, the protests in Ukraine. When the oligarchs he has created fall out of favor, first Sidorov is arrested and then Berezovsky is exiled to London and the Cote d’Azur, before being found hanged in his home.

Looking back at his life at the center of power, Vadim muses that he advised Putin against many of his worst excesses but, when the leader made his wishes known, he did everything in his power to make them happen. His smirking smile and smooth talk become monotonous after a while, yet he is pitiable as a representative of an ugly time in history – and not just in Russia, where a new democratic movement was demolished in just months by a wave of authoritarianism and repression. As the film points out, polls show the figure people most admired was Stalin, for he provided an outlet to their fury and let heads roll.

There are two key moments needed to understand today’s Russia, which are surprisingly missing from the film. One is the August 1991 coup that removed Gorbachev and ultimately brought Boris Yeltsin to power, paving the way for Putin to take control. It might be too long a story to recount in a film already running over 2 ½ hours, but it is hard to understand how the imprisonment and probable state-ordered murder of Alexei Navalny could be left out of such a character-rich screenplay that ticks off figures like Eduard Limonov and Pussy Riot.

Director: Olivier Assayas
Screenplay: Olivier Assayas, Emmanuel Carrère based on a novel by Giuliano da Empoli
Cast: Paul Dano, Alicia Vikander, Jude Law, Tom Sturridge, Will Keen, Jeffrey Wright
Producers: Olivier Delbosc, Sidonie Dumas
Cinematography: Yorick Le Saux
Editing: Marion Monnier
Production design: Francois-Renaud Labartine
Costume design: Jurgen Doering
Sound: Nicolas Cantin, Nicolas Moreau, Gwennolé Le Borgne, Sarah Lelu, Olivier Goinard
Production companies: Curiosa Films, Gaumont in association with France 2 Cinéma
World Sales: Gaumont
Venue: Venice Film Festival (Competition)
In English
156 minutes

Unusually, the power dynamic – so to speak – is reversed, with Kaas playing the lead. He stars as Anker, a man prone to violence and a questionable relationship with the law. Shortly before he’s arrested for robbery, he hides the loot in a locker and gives the key to his brother Manfred (Mikkelsen), with specific instructions to retrieve the bag with the money – 41 million Danish kroner, roughly 6.5 million dollars – and bury it in the woods near their mother’s house in the countryside.

Fifteen years pass, and Anker gets released from prison. He wants to retrieve the money, not least because his former accomplice would like a share and is very violently persuasive about it, but there’s a snag: Manfred, whose mental health was fragile to begin with, is suffering from a dissociative disorder and can’t remember where exactly it is. And so the two brothers travel to their childhood home, now an Airbnb, hoping to unlock that crucial memory. Although perhaps it’s not just Manfred – who now wants to be addressed as “John” – who needs to remember stuff before it’s too late…

While some may question the choice to frame some of the film’s broader comedic moments around mental illness, Jensen approaches the matter with empathy, even when he asks Mikkelsen – clearly relishing the opportunity to play a layered supporting part that taps into many facets of his artistic persona – to jump out of windows for the sake of (darkly calibrated) laughs. Especially since it soon becomes apparent the jokes – many of them revolving around music – are part of a more intricate meditation on the nature of identity in general, and how it can be shaped by trauma.

It’s also a film about family, so it’s no surprise the director chose to surround himself with frequent collaborators, particularly in terms of casting: besides Mikkelsen and Kaas, everyone else is, for the most part, someone who has worked with Jensen at least once before (Nicolas Bro, who plays the villainous Flemming, has been in all but one of his previous features). And there’s a clear joy on the filmmaker’s part in mixing and matching the energies of seasoned performers like Søren Malling and Sofie Gråbøl, who gamely contribute to the film’s delightfully heightened reality.

Said reality is not always as well balanced as it is in Jensen’s past work (the tonal versatility takes a bit to find its feet while the plot settles in, especially given a prologue that at first glance is a bit at odds with the rest of the film), but once all the elements are properly in place, the darkly humorous stylings paired with chaotically precise action beats, assembled like an oddly charming IKEA product, are yet another enthralling trip to the weirder (cinematic) parts of Denmark.

Director & Screenwriter: Anders Thomas Jensen
Cast: Nikolaj Lie Kaas, Mads Mikkelsen, Sofie Gråbøl, Søren Malling, Bodil Jørgensen, Lars Brygmann, Kardo Razzazi, Nicolas Bro, Peter Düring
Producers: Sisse Graum Jørgensen, Sidsel Hybshmann, Lizette Jonjic
Cinematography: Sebastian Blenkov
Production design: Nikolaj Danielsen
Costume design: Rikke Simonsen
Music: Jeppe Kaas
Sound: Eddie Simonsen
Production company: Zentropa
World sales: TrustNordisk
Venue: Venice Film Festival (Out of Competition)
In Danish, Swedish
116 minutes