| 69th Venice International Film Festival | |
| Opening: | The Reluctant Fundamentalist |
| Closing: | The Man Who Laughs |
| Location: | Venice, Italy |
| Founded: | 1932 |
| Awards: | Golden Lion Pietà by Kim Ki-duk |
| Host: | Kasia Smutniak |
| Date: | 29 August – 8 September 2012 |
| Website: | Website |
| Chronology: | Venice Film Festival |
| Preceded By: | 68th |
| Followed By: | 70th |
The 69th annual Venice International Film Festival, organized by Venice Biennale, took place at Venice Lido from 29 August to 8 September 2012.[1] The festival opened with the Indian director Mira Nair's The Reluctant Fundamentalist,[2] [3] and closed with the Out of Competition film The Man Who Laughs, directed by Jean-Pierre Ameris.[4] Terrence Malick's film To the Wonder was met with both boos and cheers from critics at its premiere.[5]
The Golden Lion for Best Film was won by Pietà, directed by South Korean filmmaker Kim Ki-duk.[6] Paul Thomas Anderson for The Master won the Silver Lion for Best Director. Additionally, American actors Joaquin Phoenix and Philip Seymour Hoffman shared the prize for Best Actor for that film. Israeli actress Hadas Yaron for her performance in Fill the Void was selected as the Best Actress in the festival.[6]
The international juries of the 69th Venice International Film Festival included:[7] [8]
The following eighteen films were selected for the main competition:[9] [10]
| English title | Original title | Director(s) | Production country | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| At Any Price | data-sort-value="Bahrani" | United States | ||||
| Betrayal | Измена | data-sort-value="Serebrennikov" | Russia | |||
| Dormant Beauty | Bella addormentata | data-sort-value="Bellocchio" | Italy, France | |||
| data-sort-value="Fifth" | The Fifth Season | data-sort-value="Cinquième" | La cinquième saison | data-sort-value="Brosens" | Peter Brosens, Jessica Woodworth | Belgium, Netherlands, France |
| Fill the Void | למלא את החלל | data-sort-value="Burshtein" | Israel | |||
| It Was the Son | È stato il figlio | data-sort-value="Cipri" | Italy | |||
| Lines of Wellington | Linhas de Wellington | data-sort-value="Sarmiento" | Portugal, France | |||
| The Master | data-sort-value="Anderson" | United States | ||||
| Beyond Outrage | アウトレイジ ビヨンド | data-sort-value="Kitano" | Japan | |||
| Paradies: Glaube | data-sort-value="Seidl" | Austria, France, Germany | ||||
| Passion | data-sort-value="De Palma" | France, Germany | ||||
| Pietà | 피에타 | data-sort-value="Ki-duk" | Kim Ki-duk | South Korea | ||
| Something in the Air | Après mai | data-sort-value="Assayas" | France | |||
| data-sort-value="Special" | A Special Day | data-sort-value="Giorno" | Un giorno speciale | data-sort-value="Comencini" | Italy | |
| Spring Breakers | data-sort-value="Korine" | United States | ||||
| Superstar | data-sort-value="Giannoli" | France, Belgium | ||||
| Thy Womb | Sinapupunan | data-sort-value="Mendoza" | Philippines | |||
| To the Wonder | data-sort-value="Malick" | United States | ||||
The following films were selected for the out of competition section:[11]
| English title | Original title | Director(s) | Production country | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fiction | |||||
| Bait 3D | data-sort-value="Rendall" | Australia, Singapore | |||
| The Company You Keep | data-sort-value="Redford" | United States | |||
| Disconnect | data-sort-value="Rubin" | ||||
| Du hast es versprochen | data-sort-value="Schmidt" | Alex Schmidt | Germany | ||
| Gebo and the Shadow | O Gebo e a Sombra | data-sort-value="Oliveira" | Portugal, France | ||
| The Iceman | data-sort-value="Vromen" | United States | |||
| Looking for Hortense | Cherchez Hortense | data-sort-value="Bonitzer" | France | ||
| Love Is All You Need | Den Skaldede Frisør | data-sort-value="Bier" | Denmark, Sweden | ||
| data-sort-value="Man" | The Man Who Laughs (closing film) | L’homme qui rit | data-sort-value="Ameris" | France, Czech Republic | |
| Penance (episodes 1-5) | 贖罪 | data-sort-value="Kurosawa" | Japan | ||
| The Reluctant Fundamentalist (opening film) | data-sort-value="Nair" | India, Pakistan, United States | |||
| Tai Chi 0 | 太極：從零開始 | data-sort-value="Fung" | China | ||
| Non-fiction | |||||
| Bad 25 | Spike Lee | United States | |||
| Enzo Avitabile Music Life | Jonathan Demme | Italy, United States | |||
| Lullaby to My Father | Amos Gitai | Israel, France, Switzerland | |||
| Peter Brook: The Tightrope | Simon Brook | United Kingdom, France, Italy | |||
| Special Screenings | |||||
| Anton’s Right Here | Anton tut ryadom | Lyubov Arkus | Russia | ||
| Clarisse | Liliana Cavani | Italy | |||
| Come voglio che sia il mio futuro | Maurizio Zaccaro | ||||
| The Human Cargo | La nave dolce | Daniele Vicari | Italy, Albania | ||
| Impenetrable | El impenetrable | Daniele Incalcaterra, Fausta Quattrini | Argentina, France | ||
| It Was Better Tomorrow | Ya man aach | Hinde Boujemaa | Tunisia | ||
| Medici con l'Africa | Carlo Mazzacurati | Italy | |||
| Sfiorando Il Muro | Silvia Giralucci, Luca Ricciardi | ||||
| Witness: Libya | Abdallah Omeish | United States | |||
The following films were selected for the Horizons (Orizzonti) section:[12]
| English title | Original title | Director(s) | Production country | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| In Competition | |||||
| Araf - Somewhere in Between | Araf | data-sort-value="Ustaoglu" | Turkey | ||
| Balancing Act | data-sort-value="Equilibristi" | Gli equilibristi | data-sort-value="De Matteo" | Italy, France | |
| Boxing Day | data-sort-value="Rose" | United Kingdom, United States | |||
| data-sort-value="Cutoff" | The Cutoff Man | Menatek Ha-Maim | data-sort-value="Hubel" | Idan Hubel | Israel |
| Fly with the Crane | 告訴他們，我乘白鶴去了 | China | |||
| data-sort-value="Hijacking" | A Hijacking | Kapringen | data-sort-value="Lindholm" | Denmark | |
| The Interval | data-sort-value="Intervallo" | L'intervallo | data-sort-value="Di Costanzo" | Italy, Switzerland, Germany | |
| Lions | Leones | data-sort-value="Lopez" | Argentina, France, Netherlands | ||
| Low Tide | data-sort-value="Minervini" | United States, Italy, Belgium | |||
| Me Too | Ja tozhe hochu | data-sort-value="Balabanov" | Russia | ||
| data-sort-value="Paternal" | The Paternal House | Khanéh Pedari | data-sort-value="Ayari" | Kianoosh Ayari | Iran |
| Pretty Butterflies | Bellas mariposas | Salvatore Mereu | Italy | ||
| Tango libre | data-sort-value="Fonteyne" | Belgium, France, Luxembourg | |||
| Three Sisters | 三姊妹 | data-sort-value="Bing" | China, France, Hong Kong | ||
| Wadjda | وجدة | data-sort-value="Al Mansour" | Saudi Arabia, Germany | ||
| Winter of Discontent | الشتا إللى فات | data-sort-value="El Batout" | Egypt | ||
| Yema | data-sort-value="Sahraoui" | Algeria, France | |||
| data-sort-value="Millennial" | The Millennial Rapture | Sennen no yuraku | data-sort-value="Wakamatsu" | Japan | |
| Short Films Competition | |||||
| Cargo | Carlo Sironi | Italy | |||
| Diamond Sutra | Jingang Jing | Tsai Ming-liang | Taiwan | ||
| The Flute | Bansulli | Min Bham | Nepal | ||
| Frank-Étienne vers la béatitude | Constance Meyer | France | |||
| I’m the One | Paola Morabito | Australia | |||
| Invitation | Cho-De | Min-Young Yoo | South Korea | ||
| Living Still Life | Bertrand Mandico | France, Belgium, Germany | |||
| Luisa no está en casa | Celia Rico Clavellino | Spain | |||
| Out Of Frame | Titloi telous | Yorgos Zois | Greece | ||
| Las manos limpias | Carlos Armella | Mexico | |||
| Marla | Nick King | Australia | |||
| Miracle Boy | Jake Mahaffy | United States | |||
| Resistance | Resistente | Renate Costa Perdomo, Salla Sorri | Denmark, Paraguay, Finland | ||
| La sala | Alessio Giannone | Italy | |||
| The Tuner | O Afinador | Fernando Camargo, Matheus Parizi | Brazil | ||
The following selection of restored classic films and documentaries on cinema were screened for this section:[13]
| English title | Original title | Director(s) | Production country | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Restored Films | ||||||
| data-sort-value="10th" | The 10th Victim (1965) | data-sort-value="Decima" | La decima vittima | data-sort-value="Petri" | Italy | |
| American Dreams (1984) | data-sort-value="Benning" | United States | ||||
| Carmen Comes Home (1951) | カルメン故郷に帰る | data-sort-value="Keisuke" | Japan | |||
| Chimes at Midnight (1965) | Campanadas a medianoche | data-sort-value="Welles" | Spain | |||
| Fanny and Alexander (1982) | Fanny och Alexander | data-sort-value="Bergman" | Sweden | |||
| Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953) | data-sort-value="Hawks" | United States | ||||
| The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947) | data-sort-value="Mankiewicz" | |||||
| Heaven’s Gate (1980) | data-sort-value="Cimino" | |||||
| Miracle (1982) | Himala | data-sort-value="Bernal" | Philippines | |||
| Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion (1970) | Indagine su un cittadino al di sopra di ogni sospetto | data-sort-value="Petri" | Italy | |||
| data-sort-value="Mattei" | The Mattei Affair (1972) | data-sort-value="Caso" | Il caso Mattei | data-sort-value="Rosi" | ||
| Pigsty (1969) | Porcile | data-sort-value="Pasolini" | ||||
| Red Shirts (1952) | Camicie rosse | data-sort-value="Alessandrini" | ||||
| Stromboli (1950) | Stromboli, terra di Dio | data-sort-value="Rossellini" | ||||
| Sunset Boulevard (1950) | data-sort-value="Wilder" | United States | ||||
| Tell Me Lies (1968) | data-sort-value="Brook" | United Kingdom | ||||
| To Be Twenty in the Aures (1972) | Avoir 20 ans dans les Aurès | data-sort-value="Vautier" | France | |||
| Documentaries about Cinema | ||||||
| Las versiones de campanadas a medianoche de Orson Welles | Luciano Berriatúa | Spain | ||||
| Monicelli: La versione di Mario | Mario Canale, Felice Farina, Mario Gianni, Wilma Labate, Annarosa Morri | Italy | ||||
| Gli anni delle immagini perdute | Adolfo Conti | |||||
| Dreamers | Conteurs d'images | Noelle Deschamps | France | |||
| Dai nostri inviati alla Mostra di Venezia | Giuseppe Giannotti, Enrico Salvatori, Davide Savelli | Italy | ||||
| Harry Dean Stanton: Partly Fiction | Sophie Huber | United States, Switzerland | ||||
| Miradas múltiples (La máquina loca) | Emilio Maillé | Mexico, France, Spain | ||||
| La guerra dei vulcani | Francesco Patierno | Italy | ||||
| Valentino's Ghost | Michael Singh | United States, India | ||||
| Sedia Elettrica: il making of del film Io e Te | Monica Strambini | Italy | ||||
The following rare films from the Biennale's Historical Archives were screened for this retrospective section:[14]
| English Title | Original Title | Director(s) | Production country | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ahora te vamos a llamar hermano (1971) | data-sort-value="Ruiz" | Chile | |||
| data-sort-value="Bagful" | A Bagful of Fleas (1963) | Pytel blech | data-sort-value="Chytilová" | Czechoslovakia | |
| data-sort-value="Brigand" | The Brigand (1961) | Il brigante | data-sort-value="Castellani" | Italy | |
| God Needs Man (1950) | Dieu a besoin des hommes | data-sort-value="Delannoy" | France | ||
| Free at Last (1968) | data-sort-value="Shuker" | Gregory Shuker, James Desmond, Nicholas Proferes | United States | ||
| Genghis Khan (1950) | data-sort-value="Conde" | Manuel Conde, Salvador Lou | Philippines | ||
| data-sort-value="Last" | The Last Night (1936) | Poslednjaja noc’ | data-sort-value="Rajzman" | Julij Jakovlevic Rajzman | Soviet Union |
| Mud-Covered City (1963) | Zablácené Mesto | data-sort-value="Táborský" | Václav Táborský | Czechoslovakia | |
| Pagine chiuse (1968) | data-sort-value="Da Campo" | Gianni Da Campo | Italy | ||
| Stress Is Three (1968) | Stress-es tres-tres | data-sort-value="Saura" | Spain | ||
The following films of the Official Selection were presented as Special Screenings:[15]
| Original Title | Director(s) | Production country |
|---|---|---|
| Carmel (2009) | Israel, France, Italy | |
| Convitto Falcone | Italy | |
| Hommage to Simone Massi | Simone Massi |
The following films were selected for the Critics' Week:[16] [17]
| English title | Original title | Director(s) | Production country | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| In competition | ||||
| Eat Sleep Die | Äta sova dö | Gabriela Pichler | Sweden | |
| The Ideal City | La città ideale | Italy | ||
| Mold | Küf | Ali Aydın | Turkey, Germany | |
| A Month in Thailand | O luna in Thailandia | Paul Negoescu | Romania | |
| She Doesn't Want to Sleep Alone | No quiero dormir sola | Natalia Beristain | Mexico | |
| Welcome Home | Welcome Home | Tom Heene | Belgium | |
| Lotus | Xiao he | Liu Shu | China | |
| Out of Competition | ||||
| Water (Opening film) | Nir Sa'ar, Maya Sarfaty, Mohammad Fuad, Yona Rozenkier, Mohammad Bakri, Ahmad Bargouthi, Pini Tavger, Tal Haring | Israel, Palestine, France | ||
| Kiss of the Damned (closing film) | Xan Cassavetes | United States | ||
The following films were selected for the Venice Days section:[18] [19] [20]
| English title | Original title | Director(s) | Production country | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| In competition | |||||
| Blondie | data-sort-value="Ganslandt" | Jesper Ganslandt | Sweden | ||
| Crawl | data-sort-value="Lasgouttes" | Hervé Lasgouttes | France | ||
| Epilogue | Hayuta ve Berl | data-sort-value="Manor" | Amir Manor | Israel | |
| Il Gemello | Vincenzo Marra | Italy | |||
| data-sort-value="Inheritance" | Inheritance | Héritage | data-sort-value="Abbass" | France, Israel, Turkey | |
| Keep Smiling | Gaigimet | data-sort-value=Chkonia"" | France, Georgia, Luxembourg | ||
| Kinshasa Kids | data-sort-value="Wajnberg" | Belgium, France | |||
| Pinocchio | data-sort-value="D Alò" | France | |||
| Queen of Montreuil | data-sort-value="Anspach" | ||||
| Steel | Acciaio | data-sort-value="Mordini" | Italy | ||
| Stories We Tell | data-sort-value="Polley" | Canada | |||
| data-sort-value="Weight" | The Weight | 무게 | data-sort-value="Kyu-hwan" | South Korea | |
| Special Events | |||||
| Terramatta | Costanza Quatriglio | Italy | |||
| Non mi avete convinto | Filippo Vendemmiati | ||||
| Bob Wilson's Life and Death of Marina Abramović | Giada Colagrande | ||||
| L'uomo che amava il cinema | Marco Segato | ||||
| 6 sull'autobus | Simone Dante Antonelli, Giacomo Bisordi, Rita de Donato, Irene di Lelio, Antonio Ligas, Emiliano Russo | ||||
| Venice Nights | |||||
| Le cose belle | Agostino Ferrente, Giovanni Piperno | Italy | |||
| Francesco De Gregori. Finestre rotte | Stefano Pistolini | ||||
| The Golden Temple | Enrico Masi | Italy, United Kingdom | |||
| My Friend Johnny | Alessandra Cardone | Italy | |||
| Nozze d'Agosto | Andrea Parena | ||||
| Il risveglio del fiume segreto | Alessandro Scillitani | ||||
| Tralala | Masbedo | ||||
| Miu Miu Women's Tales | |||||
| It’s Getting Late | Massy Tadjedin | Italy, United States | |||
| Meshes of the Afternoon (1943) | Maya Deren | United States | |||
| Muta | Lucrecia Martel | Italy, Argentina, Paraguay | |||
| The Powder Room | Zoe Cassavetes | Italy, United Kingdom | |||
| The Woman Dress | Giada Colagrande | Italy, United States | |||
| Special Projects (Cinema Corsaro) | |||||
| Gli intrepidi | Giovanni Cioni | Italy | |||
| Iolanda tra bimba e corsara | Tonino De Bernardi | ||||
| Games | Alessio Di Zio | United States | |||
| Fame in California | |||||
| Tacoma | |||||
| Vers Madrid: The Burning Bright | Sylvain George | Spain, France | |||
| Le tigri di Mompracem (TV Mini-Series 1974) | Ugo Gregoretti | Italy | |||
| Carmela, Saved by the Buccaneers | Carmela, salvata dai filibustieri | Giovanni Maderna, Mauro Santini | |||
| Materiali preparatori inediti per il film: "Altrove" | Corso Salani | ||||
| Egh c'è e non c'è - Carta bianca a Enrico Ghezzi | Enrico Ghezzi | ||||
| Lux Prize | |||||
| Just the Wind | Csak a szél | Benedek Fliegauf | Hungary | ||
| Shun Li and the Poet | Io sono Li | Andrea Segre | Italy | ||
| Tabu | Miguel Gomes | Portugal, Germany, Brazil, France | |||
The following Official Awards were conferred at the 69th edition:[21]
The following official and collateral awards were conferred to films of the autonomous sections:
The following collateral awards were conferred to films of the official selection:[22]
The jury led by filmmaker Michael Mann originally was to award the top Golden Lion prize to Paul Thomas Anderson's The Master, along with the Silver Lion Best Director award and the Best Actor award.[24] [25] [26] However, because of festival's new rule prohibiting pairing the Golden Lion with any other prizes, the jury was asked "to re-deliberate to remove" one of the awards for The Master, and the Golden Lion was awarded to Kim Ki-duk's Pietà instead.[24] [26] On the other hand, the jury was planned to award the Coppa Volpi for the Best Actress prize to Jo Min-su, who acted Jang Mi-sun in Pietà. However, because of the festival's new rule, the jury couldn't award a prize to Jo Min-su.[27] In the official reception which was held after the festival was over, many juries, such as Samantha Morton and Peter Chan met Jo, saying that "Jo's acting was touching that changed my life. I shed tears of Jo's play."[28] [29]