Highlights of Venice as film festival wraps up

The Venice Film Festival wraps up Saturday with an awards ceremony during which the prestigious Golden Lion for best film will be handed out.

Here are some of the highlights and main talking points of the 11-day festival as chosen by AFP:

– Gaza drama –

A film about a five-year-old Palestinian girl killed by Israeli troops while fleeing Gaza City last year got the biggest audience reaction of all the premieres — 23 minutes of applause and audible sobs throughout.

“The Voice of Hind Rajab” from French-Tunisian director Kaouther Ben Hania premiered on Wednesday just days after thousands of protesters shouting “Stop the genocide!” marched to the gates of the festival in a peaceful demonstration.

– Playing Putin –

Vladimir Putin may profess to be unaware of the film about him starring Jude Law, but the British actor said he had been obsessively watching the Russian leader for his role in “The Wizard of the Kremlin” by French director Olivier Assayas.

Bearing an uncanny resemblance to a younger Putin, Law copies his distinctive walk as well as his trademark deadpan expression — the “mask” that made the daunting role even harder, the 52-year-old admitted.

– Bigelow’s bombs –

As if the world didn’t have enough to worry about, “Zero Dark Thirty” director Kathryn Bigelow wants to remind everyone that we are only a misstep away from nuclear Armageddon.

Her political thriller “A House of Dynamite” put Venice viewers on the edge of their seats, prompting the Hollywood Reporter to write: “You stagger out at the end of it wondering if the world will still be intact.”

– Stone’s shave –

Chained up and bloodied for much of her role in sci-fi satire “Bugonia”, Oscar winner Emma Stone was pushed to some uncomfortable places by director Yorgos Lanthimos, including a scene in which her head is shaved.

Asked about having a buzzcut on camera — her hair is now starting to grow out — the actress said it had its upsides: “It’s so much easier than any hairstyle.”

– The Rock’s range –

Best known as a muscle-bound action hero in films like the “Fast & Furious” franchise, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson revealed his tender side with a moving performance in “The Smashing Machine” by Benny Safdie.

The wrestler-turned-actor admitted to wanting to stretch himself with the role as a troubled pioneering late-1990s mixed martial arts (MMA) fighter — and many critics were floored by his success.

– Hollywood misfires –

Two of the biggest stars on the Venice Lido this year were Julia Roberts, making her first appearance at the Italian festival, and George Clooney.

They certainly brought A-list glamour to the red carpet, but both their films — unwieldy #MeToo drama “After the Hunt” by Luca Guadagnino and saccharine showbiz study “Jay Kelly” by Noah Baumbach — fizzled.

– Black-and-white beauty –

An adaptation of Albert Camus’s 1942 novella “The Stranger” by French director Francois Ozon brought the blinding sun and dark shadows of French colonial Algeria into full relief as one of a trio of high-profile black-and-white premieres.

If “Sotto le Nuvole” (Below the Clouds), a sumptuous documentary about Naples by Italy’s Gianfranco Rosi, was a feast for the eyes, Julian Schnabel’s uneven and — mostly — monochrome “In the Hand of Dante” left many scratching their heads.

– Veterans honoured –

Two lifetime achievement awards were bestowed this year, the first on the opening night to eclectic German director Werner Herzog, 83, for his body of more than 70 movies, including his latest documentary “Ghost Elephants”.

Hitchcock heroine Kim Novak, the blonde star of “Vertigo”, now aged 92, was honoured with her own golden gong and a new documentary — “Kim Novak’s Vertigo” — which revealed how she turned her back on the Hollywood studio system after rising to stardom in the 1950s and ’60s.

– Best of the rest –

Netflix subscribers will soon be able to judge Mexican director Guillermo del Toro’s big-budget adaptation of “Frankenstein” for themselves, but critics gave it mostly positive marks.

Hungarian filmmaker Ildiko Enyedi delivered a quietly compelling look at humanity’s attempt to understand the natural world, while madcap and darkly satirical Danish drama “The Last Viking” featuring Mads Mikkelsen was a buzzy out-of-competition entry.

South Korean director Park Chan-wook’s “No Other Choice”, about a job-seeking paper company employee who kills his potential competitors for a new position, also had many fans on the waterfront Venice Lido.

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