Audrey Diwan’s 1960s abortion drama “The Event” (“Passing”) won the Golden Lion at the 78th Venice International Film Festival, while the runner-up was for the semi- autobiographical text by Paolo Sorrentino “The hand of God”.
Diwan’s film about a French college student who encounters an unwanted pregnancy was the unanimous choice of the prestigious jury that included recent Oscar Bong winners Joon Ho and Chloé Zhao.
This year’s competition was solid, including well-received films such as “The Power of the Dog” by Jane Campion. “Parallel Parents” by Pedro Almodóvar, “The Lost Daughter” by Maggie Gyllenhaal and “The Hand of God.” Twenty-one films were vying for the award, which has become a promising initial indicator of a film’s Oscar prospects.
“I made this film in anger. I also made the film with gusto. I did it with my belly, my guts, my heart, my head, ”Diwan said on Saturday. “I wanted Happening to be an experience.”
Diwan is the sixth woman to direct a Golden Lion winning film. Others are Chloé Zhao (“Nomadland”), Margarethe Von Trotta (“Marianne & Juliane”), Agnes Varda (“Vagabond”), Mira Nair (“Monsoon Wedding”) and Sofia Coppola (“Somewhere”).
“The hand of God” by Sorrentino based on a formative personal tragedy, he took the silver while Campion won the silver lion for best director for his epic epic “The Power of His Dog.” This is the second time he has won a second prize in Venice. The first was in 1990 for “An Angel at My Table,” a biopic of Janet Frame.
“It’s amazing to get an award from your people,” Campion said, speaking to the jury that was by his side. “You set the bar very, very high for me in the movies, Bong, Chloé.”
Penelope Cruz won the Fox Cup for Best Actress for her performance as a new mother in Almodovar’s “Parallel Mothers.” He thanked his director and frequent contributor for “inspiring me every day with your search for the truth.”
“You’ve created magic again and I couldn’t be more grateful or proud to be a part of it,” Cruz continued. “I adore you”.
Gyllenhaal won Best Screenplay for her adaptation of Elena Ferrante’s 2008 novel “The Lost Daughter,” which is both her first screenplay and film as a director.
“I can’t tell you how excited I am to be here,” Gyllenhaal said. “I got married in Italy, in Puglia. I found out I was pregnant with my second daughter in Italy. And really my life as a director and writer and my film were born here in this theater ”.
Gyllenhaal said his film is “Italian in its bones” even though it was shot in Greece and in English.
“In a way, as women, we were born into an agreement to shut up and Ferrante broke that agreement,” Gyllenhaal said. “I had the same feeling of seeing ‘The Piano’ when I was in high school.”
John Arcilla was awarded the Fox Cup for Best Actor for “On the Job: The Missing 8.”
The festival has been restored in the last decade as the pre-eminent launch pad for award nominees. Zhao’s “Nomadland” won the award last year and won Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actor at the Oscars. In addition to Zhao and Bong, who held the presidency, the jury also featured actors Sarah Gadon and Cynthia Erivo and directors Saverio Costanzo (“My Bright Friend”) and Alexander Nanau (“Collective”).
Zhao’s career was the second time in four years that the Golden Lion winner won the best film. Guillermo del Toro’s “The Shape of Water” shared a similar path. Venice’s 2019 winner, “Joker,” simply got 10 head gestures with the Oscar, including one for Best Picture.
Not winning the top prize in Venice, however, doesn’t end an Oscar campaign before it starts. Many eventual winners were simply released at the festival and not always in the competition before winning the best film (“Birdman” and “Spotlight”) or the best director (Damien Chazelle for “La La Land”, Alfonso Cuarón for ” Gravity “and” Rome, “by Toro for” The Shape of Water “and Alejandro G. Iñarritu for” Birdman “).
Some of this year’s biggest premieres were not part of the competition, including Ridley Scott’s “The Last Duel,” Denis Villeneuve’s “Dune” and “Last Night in Soho,” by Edgar Wright.
In the Horizons section, which features emerging filmmakers, Laurynas Bareisa’s “Pilgrims” won Best Picture. The actor’s award went to Piseth Chhun for “White Building” and the actress to Laure Calamy for “A plein temps,” which also won Best Director for Eric Gravel.
The awards ceremony marks the end of the first major film festival of the autumn season, which so far seems a resounding success, despite the delta variant. COVID security protocols were strict and movies strong.
But Venice also successfully brought glamor to a red carpet that may have been less crowded than usual, but offset in viral moments, from a calf hug between co-stars Oscar Isaac and Jessica Chastain to her debut in Jennifer Lopez’s red carpet. and Ben Affleck – although maybe we should say remake of debut, as the two reactivated a romance that ended 18 years ago.
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Follow AP film writer Lindsey Bahr on Twitter: www.twitter.com/ldbahr