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The Venice Film Festival will honor Oscar-winning Italian actor/director Roberto Benigni with its 2021 Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement.

Benigni, whose “Life Is Beautiful” – which he co-wrote, directed and starred in – won three Oscars in 1999, including best actor, recently returned to the big screen playing Geppetto in Matteo Garrone’s live-action adaptation of “Pinocchio.”

“Pinocchio,” which was a box office champ in Italy in 2019, has been recently released in the U.S. by Roadside Attractions and is nominated for 2021 Oscars in the best costume design and makeup and hairstyling categories.

Benigni’s last directorial effort is “The Tiger and the Snow,” in 2005, in which he also starred. In recent years the beloved Italian showman has been active with his stage adaptation of Dante’s “Divine Comedy,” which toured in Italy and around the world.

In praising Benigni Venice artistic director Alberto Barbera noted that “few artists have equaled his ability to combine explosive comic timing,...

While many consider Groundhog Day to be an annual celebration to the hilarious and distinguished career of Bill Murray, the Toronto International Film Festival officially declared September 5th as "Bill Murray Day," and the fest and its attendees paid tribute to the comedian with a retrospective of his work (including screenings of Ghostbusters and Stripes), a Q&A session, and the world premiere of Murray's latest film St. Vincent with Melissa McCarthy.

A sudden burst of heavy rain attempted to mar "Bill Murray Day" in the Canadian city as hundreds of fans became soaked,...

Italian screenwriter, novelist and poet who formed a successful partnership with the film director Roberto Benigni

Although he was a respected novelist and poet, Vincenzo Cerami, who has died aged 72 after a long illness, was perhaps best known as a screenwriter, thanks to his long partnership with the director Roberto Benigni. The pair co-wrote six films and had their greatest success with La Vita è Bella (Life Is Beautiful, 1997), which starred Benigni as a Jewish internee in a concentration camp, desperately pretending to his young son that it is all a game. The film won three Oscars and had a further four nominations, including for best screenplay. "Knowing Vincenzo was a gift," said Benigni, "because he taught people's hearts to beat."

On their early films together, Cerami was not able to totally sublimate Benigni's excesses as an actor. Nevertheless, Il Piccolo Diavolo (The Little Devil, 1988), Johnny Stecchino (1991) and Il Mostro (The Monster,...