The 69th Venice International Film Festival is taking place from August 29 to September 8, 2012. It was founded on the initiative of the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini back in 1932. Since then, every year, with the exception of the Second World War and the late 60s, the festival has been held on the island of Lido.
The main program of the festival includes full-length films that have not been previously shown to the audience and have not participated in other competitions. The selection of films is carried out by the director of the festival and a commission of five people, sometimes foreign consultants are involved in the selection. Usually, no more than 20 films are selected; in 2012, 18 films were presented at the 69th festival.
The jury of the film festival includes cultural and art workers, significant persons in the world cinema, from 7 to 9 people in total. The best film receives the main award Golden Lion, the best director receives the Silver Lion, the Volpi Cup is awarded to the actors who have played the best male and female roles, the best young actor or actress receives the Marcello Mastroianni Prize, and for the best script, cinematography, etc. the Osella prize is awarded.
The official program of the 69th Venice International Film Festival was announced on July 26, 2012. For the competitive screening were selected as films of such masters of world cinema as Takeshi Kitano ("Mayhem 2" - the continuation of the crime drama), Brian De Palma (erotic thriller "Passion"), Terrence Malik ("To the admiration" - a melodrama with Ben Affleck and Olga Kurylenko, starring), Kim Ki Duka ("Pieta" is a film about revenge and forgiveness), and the work of young novice directors.
In addition to Malik, the USA presented at the festival Paul Thomas Andersen with the drama about the 50s "Master", Harmony Corin with the comedy adventure drama "Loose Vacations" with Selena Gomez in one of the main roles, Ramin Bahrani with the film "Any Cost".
From Italy this time there were Daniel Cipri with the film "He was a son" and Francesca Comencini with "A Special Day". Together with the French, the Italians, led by director Marco Bellocchio, presented the painting The Sleeping Beauty for the competition.
In addition to these films, Rama Berstein (Fill the Void), Peter Brossens and Jessica Woodworth (Season Five), Ulrich Seidl (Paradise: Vera), Xavier Giannoli (Superstar), Valeria Sarmiento (Wellington), Brillante Mendoza (The Womb), Olivier Assayas (Something in the Air).
Russian director Kirill Serebrennikov also participates in the main competition with the film "Treason" about jealousy, passion and the search for solutions in difficult life circumstances.
In the program "Horizons", in which new trends in the development of cinema are presented, the 14th picture of Alexei Balabanov, the mystical film "I Want Too", is on display. Out of competition will be shown the documentary work of the Russian director Lyubov Arkus "Anton is here beside".
In just 12 days of the festival, viewers will see 50 world premieres and 29 restored archival films.
