The Venice Film Festival is upon us, and that means a lot of movies with awards season potential. But what to watch?!
THR‘s chief film critic surveys the Lido lineup for the films he’s most looking forward to.
AFTER THE HUNT
Luca Guadagnino’s latest gives Julia Roberts what reportedly is one of her most complex roles as Alma Olsson, a self-possessed Yale philosophy professor in a comfortable marriage, put in a difficult position when her PhD candidate protégée (Ayo Edebiri) accuses Alma’s colleague and friend (Andrew Garfield) of sexual assault. A thorny examination of contemporary morality ensues, as Alma is forced to wade through professional, political and personal issues stemming from her secretive past without bringing down her neatly structured world. Michael Stuhlbarg and Chloë Sevigny round out the ensemble cast.
DUSE
The stirring large-canvas classical storytelling of Pietro Marcello’s 2019 literary adaptation Martin Eden snagged Luca Marinelli the best actor prize in Venice. The director returns with this biographical drama starring Valeria Bruni Tedeschi as legendary Italian stage actress Eleonora Duse, a giant of early 20th century theater, considered by many to be the greatest of her time. Marcello focuses on her difficult return to the stage during the fraught period between World War I and the rise of Fascism, a decade after poor health and taxing years of international touring had forced her into retirement. In a rapidly changing world, Duse’s art became a revolutionary act of truth and resistance.
FATHER MOTHER SISTER BROTHER
Strong buzz has been circulating on Jim Jarmusch’s latest for months. (Producers are rumored to have declined an out-of-competition berth in Cannes in favor of competition in Venice.) The feature is a triptych of contemporary character studies set in three different countries — Northeast U.S., Dublin, Ireland and Paris, France — observing the relationships between adult children and their somewhat distant parents. Described as “a comedy interwoven with threads of melancholy,” the film’s formidable cast includes Cate Blanchett, Adam Driver, Vicky Krieps, Mayim Bialik, Tom Waits and Charlotte Rampling.
FRANKENSTEIN
The meeting of Guillermo del Toro with Mary Shelley’s immortal Gothic novel has been a long time coming, an encounter made even more intriguing by the reported inspiration of comic book artist Bernard Wrightson’s 1983 version. The visionary Mexican director casts Oscar Isaac as Victor Frankenstein, the egotistical scientist who attempts to play God, bringing to life a tragic creature consumed by emptiness, played by Jacob Elordi. That monstrous experiment becomes the undoing of both creator and creation. Mia Goth also stars as the scientifically curious fiancée of Victor’s brother, while Christoph Waltz plays her uncle, Victor’s arms merchant patron.
GHOST ELEPHANTS
One of Werner Herzog‘s standout features of recent years is Grizzly Man, his double-edged documentary portrait of environmental activist Timothy Treadwell, whose unsafe interactions with brown bears over 13 summers in Alaska led to his gruesome death. The uncompromising German director returns to nature for inspiration in his latest nonfiction work, though it promises to be anything but a conventional wildlife film, described by Herzog as a “fantasy of elephants.” Information on the film suggests parallels to Moby Dick in its search for a legendary, possibly mythical herd of elephants in Angola, following KhoiSan trackers on a spiritual quest.
LA GRAZIA
Paolo Sorrentino, who drew international acclaim with Oscar winner The Great Beauty, returns to the Venice competition four years after winning the Grand Jury Prize with The Hand of God. Described by Venice chief Alberto Barbera as “a work of great originality and powerful relevance to the present time,” the new film reunites the director with frequent collaborator Toni Servillo, playing a fictional Italian president preparing to step down from office in a drama that reflects on power, influence and the weight of history.
A HOUSE OF DYNAMITE
Kathryn Bigelow’s first new feature in eight years promises more of the grit, muscularity and high tension she brought to gut-wrenching dramas The Hurt Locker, Zero Dark Thirty and Detroit. Scripted by Noah Oppenheim, who won best screenplay in Venice for Pablo Larraín’s Jackie, the Oscar-winning director’s new film is a political action thriller that seeds panic in the White House when a single, unattributed missile is launched against the U.S. The stacked ensemble includes Idris Elba, Rebecca Ferguson, Gabriel Basso, Jared Harris, Tracy Letts, Anthony Ramos, Greta Lee and Jason Clarke.
JAY KELLY
Premiering his third consecutive feature in Venice, following Marriage Story and White Noise, Noah Baumbach co-wrote this bittersweet comedy-drama with Emily Mortimer. It stars George Clooney as the title character, a famous movie star who slides into a crisis of self-doubt while traveling through Europe with his longtime manager Ron, played by Adam Sandler. The journey becomes an unexpectedly profound one as both men find themselves questioning their choices. The starry cast also includes Laura Dern, Billy Crudup and Riley Keogh, with Grace Edwards as Jay’s daughter and Greta Gerwig as Ron’s wife.
NO OTHER CHOICE
Park Chan-wook joined the ranks of major-name auteurs in the early 2000s, when his Vengeance Trilogy became an international sensation. The South Korean master’s two most recent features, the sumptuous erotic period piece The Handmaiden and the intricate neo-noir romance Decision to Leave, showed him at the height of his powers, an elevated genre director with unerring control. Based on the 1997 novel by prolific American crime writer Donald E. Westlake, The Ax — previously filmed by Costa-Gavras — the new movie, No Other Choice, reunites Park with Lee Byung-hun, one of the stars of his 2000 breakthrough Joint Security Area, in a drama about a man laid off from his longtime position at a paper mill, who becomes increasingly ruthless in his efforts to remain employed.
THE SMASHING MACHINE
After co-directing films with his brother Josh for more than 15 years — most recently the Adam Sandler Diamond District anxiety attack Uncut Gems — Benny Safdie goes it alone for the first time with this biographical sports drama about former wrestler and MMA fighter Mark Kerr. The two-time UFC heavyweight champion, known for doling out “ground and pound” punishment in the ring, is played by Dwayne Johnson, no stranger to the professional fight milieu. That hopefully might help him rise above his run of forgettable original streaming vehicles and sink his teeth into a real character. Emily Blunt co-stars as Kerr’s then-wife, Dawn Staples.
