Venice Film Festival 2010: Prize Winners

In the last few minutes, Sofia Coppola's "Somewhere" unanimously won the Golden Lion for Best Picture at Venice. I'm fairly surprised that it stuck out enough to warrant the big award, but there we go. Ariane Labed's Best Actress win for "Attenberg" is also a little out of the blue, given the vast amount of competition. Still, it's good when things aren't so predictable.

The full list of winners is as follows:

Golden Lion: "Somewhere" by Sofia Coppola

Silver Lion: Álex de la Iglesia for "A Sad Trumpet Ballad"

Special Jury Prize: "Essential Killing" by Jerzy Skolimowsi

Volpi Cup - Best Actor: Vincent Gallo for "Essential Killing"

Volpi Cup - Best Actress: Ariane Labed for "Attenberg"

Screenplay: "A Sad Trumpet Ballad" by Álex de la Iglesia

Venice Film Festival 2010: A Review of "Somewhere"

Somewhere

Directed by Sofia Coppola

Starring: Stephen Dorff, Elle Fanning, Chris Pontius, Michelle Monaghan, Benicio Del Toro

Grade: B -

Sofia Coppola's work frequently requires you to delve into the minds of her characters, and of her four feature-length productions, "Somewhere" is the film that most guiltily holds back on emotional expression. The story of the disillusioned celebrity is hardly a new concept, but Coppola finds a way to tell a story that doesn't play up to conceits or formulae, crafting a genuine father-daughter relationship and maintaining a rather scathing stance on "celebrity", and its tendency to distract from real-world connections.

Sparsely-shot scenes litter the first act, curbing the film's accessibility considerably. For instance, there are two separate pole dancing scenes within ten minutes of each other, and don't contribute enough to our view of Stephen Dorff's Johnny enough to warrant inclusion. The film feels wallowing and suspended before the entrance of Chloe (Fanning), and at only 90 minutes more scenes between them is needed to fully grasp the looseness of their relationship. One feels that Coppola is selling this story a little short.

Still, there are many moments where she effectively conveys the distance and distortion a life of luxury can create, and in a tenderly different way to the dislocation in "Lost in Translation". This film is more about the dangers of taking things for granted, and the denouement of Coppola's film somewhat atones for the overall slightness of its scope.

Venice Screening Schedule and Anticipation

As I've already mentioned I'm off to Venice again this year for the film festival. This is just a quick heads-up to let you know what I'll be seeing and when.

I'm planning to provide commentary on as many of the films as I can, and there'll also shortly be a special section added on the sidebar for gradings, as they filter in. Meanwhile, there'll be plenty of reaction to each film over on my Twitter page, with little zingers and the odd catty comment. Just six nights to go!

My screening schedule:

Wednesday 1 September

Black Swan

Directed by Darren Aronofsky

Starring: Natalie Portman, Mila Kunis, Vincent Cassel, Barbara Hershey, Winona Ryder

Legend of the Fist: The Return of Chen Zhen

Directed by Andrew Lau

Starring: Donnie Yen, Shu Qi, Anthony Wong, Huang Bo

Thursday 2 September

Machete

Directed by Robert Rodriguez & Ethan Maniquis

Starring: Danny Trejo, Jessica Alba, Michelle Rodriguez, Robert De Niro, Steven Seagal, Don Johnson

Dark Love

Directed by Antonio Capuano

Starring: Irene De Angelis, Gabriele Agrio, Luisa Ranieri, Corso Salani, Valeria Golino, Fabrizio Gifuni

Miral

Directed by Julian Schnabel

Starring: Freida Pinto, Hiam Abbass, Willem Dafoe, Yasmine Al Masri, Vanessa Redgrave

Norweigan Wood

Directed by Anh Hung Tran

Starring: Kenichi Matsuyama, Rinko Kikuchi, Kiko Mizuhara, Kengo Kora, Reika Kirishima

Friday 3 September

Sleeping Beauty

Directed by Catherine Breillat

Starring: Carla Besnaïnou, Julia Artamonov, Kérian Mayan, David Chausse

Somewhere

Directed by Sofia Coppola

Starring: Stephen Dorff, Elle Fanning, Benicio Del Toro, Michelle Monaghan, Laura Chiatti, Simona Ventura

Reign of Assassins

Directed by John Woo & Su Chao-Pin

Starring: Michelle Yeoh, Jung Woo Sung, Wang Xueqi, Barbie Hsu, Kelly Lin

Saturday 4 September

A Woman

Directed by Giada Colagrande

Starring: Willem Dafoe, Jess Weixler, Stefania Rocca, Michele Venitucci

Potiche

Directed by François Ozon

Starring: Catherine Deneuve, Gérard Depardieu, Fabrice Luchini, Karin Viard, Judith Godrèche, Jérémie Régnier

La Passione

Directed by Carlo Mazzacurati

Starring: Silvio Orlando, Giuseppe Battiston, Corrado Guzzanti, Cristiana Capotondi, Stefania Sandrelli, Kasia Smutniak

Sunday 5 September

Little Voices

Directed by Jairo Carrillo

(Animation)

Monday 6 September

Meek's Cutoff

Directed by Kelly Reichardt

Starring: Michelle Williams, Bruce Greenwood, Will Patton, Zoe Kazan, Paul Dano, Shirley Henderson

Tuesday 7 September

Essential Killing

Directed by Jerzy Skolimowski

Starring: Vincent Gallo, Emmanuelle Seigner

Wednesday 8 September

Promises Written In Water

Directed by Vincent Gallo

Starring: Vincent Gallo, Delfine Bafort, Sage Stallone, Lisa Love

The Town

Directed by Ben Affleck

Starring: Ben Affleck, Rebecca Hall, Jon Hamm, Jeremy Renner, Blake Lively

Black Venus

Directed by Abdellatif Kechiche

Starring: Yahima Torres, Olivier Gourmet, André Jacobs

Expect notes on previous Golden Lion and Volpi Cup winners before the festival begins; plus a review of a recent release.