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The 2024 Venice Film Festival kicked off August 28 with the long-awaited Tim Burton-Michael Keaton sequel Beetlejuice Beetlejuice opening the 81th edition, which runs through September 7 on the Lido. Deadline is on the ground to watch all the key films.

The lineup for the world’s oldest fest also includes world premieres of Todd Phillips’ Joaquin Phoenix-Lady Gaga pic Joker: Folie à Deux, Pedro Almodóvar’s The Room Next Door, Luca Guadagnino’s Queer, Pablo Larrain’s Maria Callas biopic Maria starring Angelina Jolie and new works from the likes of Alfonso Cuarón, Walter Salles, Harmony Korine, Thomas Vinterberg, Brady Corbet, Takeshi Kitano, Claude Lelouch, Errol Morris and others.

Below is a compilation of our reviews from the fest, which last year awarded its Golden Lion for best film to Yorgos Lanthimos’ Poor Things, starring Emma Stone, who went on the win the Best Actress Oscar. Isabelle Huppert heads the competition jury this year.

The war is far away, but ever so close, in Battleground (Campo di Battaglia), director Gianni Amelio’s sober study of doctors treating wounded soldiers in Italy as World War I comes to a close. Reducing the conflict to a chamber piece where a trio of former medical students clash over the moral repercussions of their duties, the film raises some interesting and altogether timely questions, but never builds into a powerful drama.

Set almost entirely in a military hospital miles from the front, Battleground fitfully conveys the utter horrors of the Great War, revealing the deep physical and psychological injuries of soldiers arriving on stretchers for treatment. Many of them are in fact so shell-shocked (what we now call Ptsd) that they’re willing to further harm themselves in order to avoid getting sent back to the front, where they are sure to die.

The patients are triaged and...

The battleground in veteran Italian director Gianni Amelio’s atmospheric feature is nominally Europe in the last furlong of the 1914-18 conflict, but the real subject is the war that the Italian government declared on its own people. There are aspects of this all-too-true story, based loosely on Carlo Patriarca’s 2020 novel The Challenge, that will resonate throughout the world, and one might think that post-Vietnam America would be especially receptive to a story about the callous deployment of young, blue-collar men into savage conflicts from which they will almost certainly never return. Amelio’s film, however, while perfect for the local market, isn’t exactly likely to cross over.

The director sets the scene with grim images of bodies piled higher and higher in bleak muddy trenches. The year is 1918, and the armistice is just around the corner, but no one on the front line can possibly know that yet.

Venice film festival

Gianni Amelio’s saga is set in 1918, when a pair of Italian doctors take very different approaches to treating the wounded that pass through their wards

Here is the upstanding infantryman of this year’s Venice film festival competition: dogged and decent, doomed to be gunned down by the judges. The festival likes to find room for the occasional domestic production in the main programme, a film that’s happy to ride its home-turf advantage but is otherwise there to make up the numbers. Gianni Amelio’s tense wartime saga is better than most but that counts for little when the battle heats up.

It is 1918, “the Year of Victory”, although in smalltown Italy it feels more akin to defeat. Alessandro Borghi and Gabriel Montesi play Giulio and Stefano, two childhood friends who work as doctors in a military hospital that has become a battleground of its own,...

New films featuring Carey Mulligan, Adam Sandler, Amanda Seyfried, Jesse Eisenberg and Riley Keough are among 2024 Berlinale Specials lineup, the out-of-competition gala presentations at next year’s Berlin International Film Festival.

Spaceman, a Netflix sci-fi drama from Chernobyl director Johan Renck, starring Sandler, Mulligan, Kunal Nayyar, Isabella Rossellini and Paul Dano, will have its world premiere in the Berlinale Special gala sidebar. Sasquatch Sunset, an adventure comedy from the Zellner brothers which stars Keough, Eisenberg, Nathan Zellner, and Christophe Zajac-Denek, will screen in Berlin after its Sundance debut. Atom Egoyan’s Seven Veils, which had its world premiere in Toronto, and stars Seyfried alongside Rebecca Liddiard, Douglas Smith, Ambur Braid, and Michael Kupfer-Radecky, will also have its international premiere in the Berlinale Specials gala section.

Treasure (aka Iron Box), the 90-set English-language feature from German director Julia von Heinz (And Tomorrow The Entire World), which stars Lena Dunham and Stephen Fry...

The Berlinale has announced the first seven productions, including one series, to be invited to the Berlinale Specials strand of its 74th edition running from February 15 to 25, 2024.

The line-up will include the world premiere of Johan Renck’s sci-fi drama Spaceman starring Adam Sandler as an astronaut on a lone space mission.

The drama, also featuring Carey Mulligan, Kunal Nayyar, Isabella Rossellini and Paul Dano in the cast, goes on worldwide release on Netflix on March 1, 2024

The Sandler sci-fi drama is due to go on worldwide release on Netflix on March 1, 2024.

There will also be international premieres for David and Nathan Zellner’s Sasquatch Sunset, with Riley Keough, Jesse Eisenberg, Nathan Zellner and Christophe Zajac-Denek, which is due to world premiere at Sundance.

Atom Egoyan’s TIFF-selected Seven Veils, featuring Amanda Seyfried, Rebecca Liddiard, Douglas Smith, Ambur Braid, Michael Kupfer-Radecky in the cast, is also in the line-up.

“We are...

Film had its market premiere at the AFM.

Italy’s Vision Distribution has closed a raft of sales for Donato Carrisi’s thriller I Am The Abyss for territories including France and Germany.

Swift Distribution has secured the rights for France. Plaion Pictures, which rebranded earlier this year from its previous name Koch Films, has acquired distribution rights for Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

In addition, Vision has sold the film’s rights to Best Film for Poland, Beta Film for Bulgaria and Swallow Wings for Taiwan.

I Am The Abyss is author and director Carrisi’s third film after The...

Italian twin directors Damiano and Fabio D’Innocenzo have started shooting in Rome on “Dostoevskij,” an eclectic detective drama involving a policeman with a troubled past.

This first TV series written and directed by the D’Innocenzo brothers – who are known on the festival circuit for dark dramas “Boy’s Cry,” “Bad Tales” and “America Latina” – is an in-house Sky Studios production produced by the Comcast-owned pay-tv player with Rome’s Paco Cinematografica.

Filippo Timi stars as Enzo Vitello, a sharp detective with a troubled past, who winds up on the blood trail of a ruthless serial killer, nicknamed Dostoevskij because of letters full of gruesome details that he leaves at crime scenes.

Haunted by the killer’s words, the policeman embarks on a dangerous solo investigation, getting closer and closer to a disturbing existential truth.

Rounding out the “Dostoevskij” cast are Gabriel Montesi (“Bad Tales”), Carlotta Gamba (“Dante”) and...

Amid the litany of horrors the biting little film Bad Tales presents, there might be a pinnacle: reading out your middle-school report card to a dining table of your parents’ closest friends. Although young Dennis (Tommaso Di Cola) and Alessia Placido (Giulietta Rebeggiani) have a stack of straight A+’s to unveil, they go through their paces with a haunted, almost inhuman stillness. The camera holds the shot in near-real time, tracking each excruciating second as the kids slowly leave the table, and return, gifted-level grades in trembling hands. But are the film’s writer-directors, twin brothers Fabio and Damiano D’Innocenzo, after our approval in an equally desperate fashion?

Bad Tales is contemporary Italian realism left to corrode and mangle out in the broiling Roman sun. The color palette is tweaked sickly yellow, and the camerawork stays at an austere distance, hovering but never pouncing like the continual buzz of...

"Something strange happened some weeks ago..." Strand Releasing has debuted a new US trailer for Bad Tales, aka Favolacce in Italian, a dark drama from Italy from the filmmaking brothers Damiano & Fabio D'Innocenzo. This originally premiered at last year's Berlin Film Festival, where it won the Silver Bear for Best Screenplay. The dark & strange film is about a few families living out on a limb in the suburbs of Rome. Tensions here can explode at any time; ultimately it's the children who bring about the collapse. But it’s the desperation and repressed rage of the children that will explode and cut through this grotesque facade, with devastating consequences for the entire community. “We want to investigate the communication breakdown in these families, immersed in the stagnancy of sterile routines, where perhaps only tragedies have the capacity to shake things up," said the directors. Bad Tales cast includes Elio Germano,...

"The following story was inspired by a true story. The true story was inspired by a false story. The false story was not very inspired." The Match Factory has unveiled a peculiar teaser trailer for an Italian film titled Bad Tales, also known as Favolacce in Italian, which is premiering at the Berlin Film Festival later this month. The only vague descriptions of the film so far involve referencing children and the chaos they bring. This Italian drama is set in the suburbs of Rome. "Tensions here can explode at any time; ultimately it's the children who bring about the collapse." Well, that sounds intense. The film stars Elio Germano, Barbara Chichiarelli, Lino Musella, Gabriel Montesi, and Max Malatesta. I'm not too sure what to make of this yet, but I have to admit this trailer definitely grabbed my attention. I'm curious about this one. Here's the first teaser trailer...

The Berlinale lineup already includes films from Jia Zhangke, Matías Piñeiro, and more, but now the competition slate has arrived and it’s an incredibly promising selection. Headed by Carlo Chatrian, it includes many of our most-anticipated films of the year with Christian Petzold’s Undine, Hong Sang-soo’s The Woman Who Ran, Tsai Ming-Liang’s Days, Philippe Garrel’s The Salt of Tears, Abel Ferrara’s Siberia, and Caetano Gotardo & Marco Dutra’s All the Dead Ones, plus recent festival favorites: Kelly Reichardt’s First Cow and Eliza Hittman’s Never Rarely Sometimes Always.

Check out the lineup below and return for our coverage.

Competition

Berlin Alexanderplatz

Germany / Netherlands

by Burhan Qurbani

with Welket Bungué, Jella Haase, Albrecht Schuch, Joachim Król, Annabelle Mandeng, Nils Verkooijen, Richard Fouofié Djimeli

World premiere

Dau. Natasha

Germany / Ukraine / United Kingdom / Russian Federation

by Ilya Khrzhanovskiy, Jekaterina Oertel

with Natalia Berezhnaya, Olga Shkabarnya, Vladimir Azhippo,...

The Berlin International Film Festival on Wednesday morning revealed the main competition lineup and gala selections for festival’s 70th edition.

The festival, which begins February 20, will screen 18 films in competition, including movies from Sally Potter, Kelly Reichardt, and Eliza Hittman. Six are from female directors.

Among the gala presentations is Pixar’s” Onward.” The Dan Scanlon-helmed urban fantasy includes the voices of Tom Holland, Chris Pratt, Julia-Louis Dreyfus, Octavia Spencer, Mel Rodriguez, Kyle Bornheimer, Lena Waithe, and Ali Wong.

Here is the complete list:

Competition

“Berlin Alexanderplatz” (Germany/Netherlands)

Director: Burhan Qurbani

Cast: Welket Bungué, Jella Haase, Albrecht Schuch, Joachim Król, Annabelle Mandeng, Nils Verkooijen, and Richard Fouofié Djimeli

“Dau. Natasha” (Germany/Ukraine/United Kingdom/Russia)

Directors: Ilya Khrzhanovskiy and Jekaterina Oertel

Cast: Natalia Berezhnaya, Olga Shkabarnya, Vladimir Azhippo, Alexei Blinov, and Luc Bigé

“Domangchin yeoja” (“The Woman Who Ran”) (South Korea)

Director: Hong Sangsoo

Cast: Kim Minhee,...

The Berlin International Film Festival has unveiled its 2020 line-up, with 18 films playing in competition from directors such as Abel Ferrara, Sally Potter, Christian Petzold, Hong Sangsoo, Kelly Reichardt and Eliza Hittman.

Abel Ferrara’s Willem Dafoe starrer “Siberia” is a world premiere in competition, as is Sally Potter’s “The Roads Not Taken.”

Among the U.S. films at the Berlinale, Reichardt’s “First Cow” is an international premiere, and so too is Hittman’s “Never Rarely Sometimes Always.”

Pixar’s latest animation, “Onward”, also has its international premiere out of competition in the Special Galas section.

Previous Berlin Silver Bear winner Christian Petzold’s latest, “Undine”, world premieres, while Iranian director Mohammed Rasoulof, who is not allowed to travel outside his home country, world premieres his latest, “There is No Evil.”

Six out of the 18 films in competition are helmed by female directors.

The 70th edition of the festival...

The Berlin Film Festival revealed its main competition lineup and additional galas this morning at a press conference in the German capital.

The lineup includes new films by Sally Potter, Kelly Reichardt, Abel Ferrara, Christian Petzold, Hong Sangsoo and Iranian filmmaker Mohammad Rasoulof (who is unable to leave Iran due to a travel ban). Scroll down for the lineup in full.

Artistic director Carlo Chatrian confirmed that all main cast and all directors – other than Rasoulof – are due to attend the festival. Guests are set to include Hillary Clinton, who is the subject of Nanette Burstein’s docu-series Hillary; Stateless star and producer Cate Blanchett; Willem Dafoe, star of Abel Ferrara’s Siberia; and Javier Bardem, Elle Fanning and Salma Hayek, the stars of Potter’s drama The Roads Not Taken.

The 18-strong competition lineup includes six films by women directors. Last year, 17 films were selected for the competition with seven helmed by women.

Sky Italia and Gomorrah producer Cattleya have unveiled the first look at their forthcoming big-budget drama Romulus, the founder and first king of Rome, which is being produced in archaic Latin.

The ITV-owned producer is producing the ten-part series, which was created by Matteo Rovere, who directed The First King feature. It marks Rovere’s television debut. The ten-part series is co-produced by Rovere’s Groenlandia and filming started in Rome last month.

It stars Andrea Arcangeli (Trust), Marianna Fontana (Indivisible) and Francesco Di Napoli (Piranhas) with Rovere directing alongside Michele Alhaique and Enrico Maria Artale. It is written by Rovere, Filippo Gravino (The First King) and Guido Iuculano (A Quiet Life).

The series is set in eighth century B.C., in a primitive and brutal world in which man’s fate is decided by the merciless power of nature and the gods. It is the story of Romulus and his twin brother Remus,...

Gomorrah producer Cattleya is making a TV drama about Romulus, the founder and first king of Rome, in archaic Latin for Sky Italia.

The ITV-owned producer is producing Romulus, created by Matteo Rovere, who directed The First King feature. It marks Rovere’s television debut. The ten-part series is co-produced by Rovere’s Groenlandia and will start filming in Rome in early June.

It will star Andrea Arcangeli (Trust), Marianna Fontana (Indivisible) and Francesco Di Napoli (Piranhas) with Rovere directing alongside Michele Alhaique and Enrico Maria Artale. It is written by Rovere, Filippo Gravino (The First King) and Guido Iuculano (A Quiet Life).

The series is set in eighth century B.C., in a primitive and brutal world in which man’s fate is decided by the merciless power of nature and the gods. It is the story of Romulus and his twin brother Remus, as seen through the...