The Daily Star, Lebanon
Aug 25 2014
Aging superheroes, philosophical pigeons at Venice Film Fest
Ella Ide| Agence France Presse
ROME: Hollywood greats Al Pacino, Ethan Hawke and Jennifer Aniston are
set to dazzle this year’s Venice Film Festival, which opens Wednesday
with tales of war and the economic crisis offset by beach parties and
gondola jaunts. Michael Keaton, of “Beetlejuice” and “Batman” fame,
will likely be the first A-lister to zip by water taxi across the
lagoon to present Mexican director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu’s
“Birdman or the Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance.”
In the first of 20 flicks vying for the Golden Lion prize, Keaton
stars as a washed-up actor, once famous for playing a superhero, who
is now struggling to put on a Broadway play in a bid to regain his
former glory.
French film composer Alexandre Desplat – whose dozens of works include
the scores for “The King’s Speech” and “Harry Potter and the Deathly
Hallows” – will head up the main jury at the 71st edition of the
world’s oldest film festival, which runs until Sept. 6.
As he unveiled the lineup in Rome last month, festival director
Alberto Barbera said many of the 55 films screening, 54 of which are
world premiers, reflect “a moment in which the specter of war is
rising dramatically again.”
Among them is “Good Kill” by New Zealand director Andrew Niccol – who
wrote “The Truman Show” – in which Hawke stars as a drone operator in
Afghanistan. Another is David Oelhoffen’s “Loin des hommes,” set
during Algeria’s war for independence, in which “Lord of the Rings”
star Viggo Mortensen plays a French teacher who unexpectedly forms a
bond with a dissident.
The five U.S. films in competition include David Gordon Green’s
“Manglehorn,” in which Al Pacino plays an ex-con turned locksmith, and
Ramin Bahrani’s drama “99 Homes,” about a father trying to recover his
house after an eviction.
It seems France will have a strong showing with four films running for
top prize, including Xavier Beauvois’ “La Rancon de la gloire,” based
on a true story about two men who plot to steal Charlie Chaplain’s
coffin in Switzerland.
>From Italy, Francesco Munzi’s “Anime Nere” explores the
Calabrian-based mafia – cocaine traffickers with a global reach –
while Saverio Costanzo’s Brooklyn-based “Hungry Hearts” tackles
extreme eating disorders.
There is buzz from critics already over the only first feature
competing for the Lion, the Turkish “Sivas,” by Kann Mujdeci, about a
young boy who befriends a stray dog he saves.
Joshua Oppenheimer fans will be looking forward to the follow-up to
his acclaimed 2012 doc “The Act of Killing.” In “The Look of Silence,”
the only documentary in competition, Indonesian genocide survivors
confront the killers of their brother.
Japan’s Shinya Tuskamoto will unveil “Fires on the Plane,” a
jungle-based horror tale set at the end of World War II. China’s
Xiaoshaui Wang will set out to scare his audience with the stalking
tale “Red Amnesia.”
Roy Andersson’s Swedish comedy “A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on
Existence” about two world-weary men on a sales trip may provide light
relief, but German-Turkish director Fatih Akin’s “The Cut” takes us
back to the theme of genocide, following a survivor of the Armenian
genocide as he searches for his daughters.
Out of competition slots have gone to U.S. director Peter
Bogdanovich’s “She’s Funny That Way,” a comedy starring Owen Wilson
and Aniston, as well as American Lisa Cholodenko’s four-part HBO
series “Olive Kitteridge,” starring Bill Murray.
Other hotly awaited flicks include Barry Levinson’s “The Humbling,”
which stars Pacino as a suicidal actor who has an affair with a much
younger lesbian, as well as “The Sound and the Fury” by U.S.
heartthrob James Franco, who will be in Venice to pick up an
innovation in cinema award.
A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Daily
Star on August 25, 2014, on page 16.
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