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The Venice Film Festival has unveiled its line-up, with just two films directed by women in competition – and a spot for controversial director Roman Polanski .
The list, announced on Thursday in Rome, highlights the 21 titles that make up its official selection.
Babyteeth by Shannon Murphy and The Perfect Candidate by Haifaa Al Mansour are the only two movies made by female directors to have made the cut.
In 2018 and 2017, the festival only shortlisted one film directed by a woman as part of its competition selection.
Polanski's inclusion in the line-up, meanwhile, has already generated some backlash on social media and is likely to remain a talking point.
Show all 49 1 /49Best films of 2019 (so far) Best films of 2019 (so far) The Favourite “Macabre and fraught though The Favourite gets, this isn’t so much a film about sex or power as it is about plain mischief. It’s a hilarious, buffoonish pleasure, right down to the sets and costume design, and a breeze to spend 120 minutes with.” Christopher Hooton
Fox Searchlight Pictures
Best films of 2019 (so far) Beautiful Boy “Casting Chalamet as Nic was a very clever move. The young actor from Call Me by Your Name and Lady Bird has a natural charm and charisma. He still engages an audience’s curiosity and sympathy even when his behaviour is at its most selfish and erratic.” Geoffrey Macnab
Amazon Studios
Best films of 2019 (so far) The House by the Sea “Guédiguian’s storytelling style is deceptive. At first, it seems as if this is low-key social realism in the Dardennes or Ken Loach mould, albeit set on the French Riviera. Gradually, though, we realise how stylised and theatrical his approach really is.” Geoffrey Macnab
Best films of 2019 (so far) Stan & Ollie “Director Jon S Baird, whose previous film was scabrous Irvine Welsh adaptation Filth, wrings every last drop of pathos he can from his material. This is very much a case of the tears of the clowns.” Geoffrey Macnab
Entertainment One
Best films of 2019 (so far) Vice “Vice is bravura storytelling. McKay isn’t only taking us through Cheney’s life and career but is giving us a whistle stop tour through US politics from the Nixon administration almost right to the present day.” Geoffrey Macnab
Annapurna Pictures
Best films of 2019 (so far) Can You Ever Forgive Me? “Playing Lee Israel, McCarthy manages something very special: she makes a character who is odd, obnoxious, difficult and alcoholic seem lovable and even heroic. The rest of the world is at fault, not Lee.” Geoffrey Macnab
Fox Searchlight Pictures
Best films of 2019 (so far) Green Book "Green Book flatters the audience about its own good sense and tolerance. It deals with racism and homophobia but still has a fairytale, fantasy feel to it. Whatever humiliations Don endures on their road trip, we know no real harm will ever come to him as long as Tony is at his side.” Geoffrey Macnab
Universal Pictures
Best films of 2019 (so far) Velvet Buzzsaw “The golden age of bonkers horror movies is gloriously evoked by Netflix’s latest feature length presentation. Beginning as a satire of the arts world, Velvet Buzzsaw swiftly and gleefully descends into a savage splatter-fest, smeared in paint, viscera and garishly-bright blood.” Ed Power
Netflix
Best films of 2019 (so far) If Beale Street Could Talk “The setting is New York in the 1970s. Anyone who has watched Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver knows this was an era of violence, corruption and sleaze on a monumental level, but [Barry] Jenkins somehow makes the city seem like a modern-day Eden.” Geoffrey Macnab
Annapurna Pictures
Best films of 2019 (so far) All Is True “Written by Ben Elton and directed by its star Kenneth Branagh, the film plays so fast and loose with the playwright’s final years that they needn’t have bothered fitting Branagh with a prosthetic nose – accuracy is clearly not the priority here.” Alexandra Pollard
Sony Pictures Classics
Best films of 2019 (so far) The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part "The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part is the doomed progeny of a celebrated genius – brilliant but slightly stunted by the knowledge they will never live up to their predecessor.” Clarisse Loughrey
Warner Bros. Pictures
Best films of 2019 (so far) Piercing “Nicolas Pesce’s sleek and stylish horror comedy is repulsive and funny by turns. In adapting Ryu Murakami’s cult novel, Pesce strikes just the right balance between humour and Grand Guignol-style shock tactics.” Geoffrey Macnab
Universal Pictures
Best films of 2019 (so far) Capernaum "The best moments here are remarkable. Labaki elicits an astonishing performance from her young lead. He’s an irrepressible figure with such an inbuilt sense of moral decency the film seems upbeat and optimistic, even at its darkest moments.” Geoffrey Macnab
Sony Pictures Classics
Best films of 2019 (so far) The White Crow "Ralph Fiennes combines thriller elements with poetic flashbacks to ballet legend Rudolf Nureyev’s childhood and keeps a tight focus on the dancer. When he is most at risk, Nureyev makes decisions with his artistic future more in mind than his personal safety. As Fiennes reminds us again and again in what is his best film yet as a director, the 'white crow' will do anything to put himself in the limelight, the one place he is convinced he belongs."
StudioCanal
Best films of 2019 (so far) Border "Border reverses the perspective taken by most other horror films. In more conventional genre fare, Tina and Vore would be portrayed as malevolent outsiders, but in the world conjured up by director Ali Abbasi, the humans are the monsters. Tina is the innocent – a visionary who hardly understands her own powers but who can sense human venality and corruption wherever it appears."
TriArt Film
Best films of 2019 (so far) Fighting with My Family "Certain scenes feel very trite and predictable but the film gets you in a choke hold early on and won’t let you go. It is far more gripping than its subject matter might suggest. Who ever would believe a story about a wrestling family from Norwich could have quite such heart and resonance?"
James Field
Best films of 2019 (so far) Us "Doppelgangers abound in Jordan Peele’s weird, creepy and ingenious new horror film. As in his Oscar-winning 2017 feature Get Out, Peele leavens matters with ironic humour but the joking becomes increasingly uncomfortable once the main characters come face to face with dark shadows of themselves which wish them extreme harm."
AP
Best films of 2019 (so far) Avengers: Endgame "The Avengers cycle comes to a rich and very satisfying conclusion with Endgame, surely the most complex and emotional superhero movie in Marvel history. At 181 minutes, this is a veritable epic, but with so many characters and plot strands, it fully warrants its lengthy running time."
AP
Best films of 2019 (so far) Eighth Grade "It’s a rare and precious feeling when a film completely dismantles you. Eighth Grade – the directorial debut of US comedian Bo Burnham – breaks down every delusion we have about ourselves and burrows deep into those parts we’ve made such an effort to lock away. You may cry. You may shudder as every awkward social interaction that’s kept you up at night replays in your head all at once. You may feel the sharp pain associated with those moments when you feel completely isolated from the world. Burnham may have crafted a simple story about the most ordinary of teenage girls, but it speaks with the emotions of a true cinematic epic."
A24
Best films of 2019 (so far) Vox Lux "Natalie Portman gives her fiercest, most memorable performance since Black Swan in Brady Corbet’s enjoyably subversive satire about a troubled pop star whose loss of innocence mirrors the fall from grace of the US itself. Portman’s character, Celeste, is certainly one of the most objectionable figures she has played: a pampered, hard-drinking drug-taking “floozy” whose appearance and high-handed behaviour rekindle memories of Liz Taylor and Joan Crawford at their monstrous worst."
Neon
Best films of 2019 (so far) High Life Robert Pattinson gives one of his most striking performances as Monte, the death-row criminal in outer space, tricked into making a voyage described at one stage as a “class-one suicide ride”. The former Twilight star makes his shaven-headed, gaunt-faced character seem hyper naturally sensitive and feral at the same time.
A24
Best films of 2019 (so far) Amazing Grace Amazing Grace is as uplifting a film as you will see all year. It’s a concert movie filmed over two nights and featuring Aretha Franklin, the “first lady of soul”, performing gospel standards in a church in Los Angeles in 1972, with a huge backing choir and an enthusiastic congregation.
Neon
Best films of 2019 (so far) Aladdin Disney’s live-action remake of its 1992 animated feature is a rip-roaring, old-fashioned matinee-style spectacle that turns out far better than we had any right to expect.
Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures
Best films of 2019 (so far) Booksmart “Olivia Wilde is a visually inventive director, who keeps the tempo here so brisk that we hardly notice how glib the storytelling sometimes becomes. We can tell exactly how the film will end, but it still feels original both in its screwball energy and in the deft way it continually reverses stereotypes and gender clichés.” Geoffrey Macnab
Annapurna Pictures
Best films of 2019 (so far) Late Night “Late Night is a caustic satirical comedy that turns into an unlikely tearjerker. It’s by turns snide and uplifting, and often very funny too. Its writer/producer/star Mindy Kaling makes vicious observations about the inanity, narcissism and corruption of the mainstream US media at the same time as she celebrates the professionalism of many of those who work within it. The film has a glorious performance from Emma Thompson and a very sly one from Kaling. Thompson is at her most imperious as Katherine Newbury, a legendary entertainer, the only female in a male-dominated field, but one whose career is beginning to slide.” Geoffrey Macnab
Amazon Studios
Best films of 2019 (so far) Gloria Bell “Gloria Bell is somewhat exhausting – both unbearably intimate and at a constant remove – but it is endlessly pulled back into focus by Moore, who has a firm understanding of the delicate balance between contentment and yearning, joy and pain, recklessness and spontaneity. In a remake that could have felt indulgent in the hands of people less skilled, she more than justifies its existence.” Geoffrey Macnab
Curzon
Best films of 2019 (so far) Toy Story 4 "The brilliance of the new film lies in the surefooted way it caters both for children too young to have seen its predecessors and for adults who’ve grown up (or grown older) watching the previous instalments. It takes some kind of genius for the Pixar animators to give such a searing emotional charge to a story in which one of the main characters is a single use plastic spork retrieved from the trash."
Pixar/Disney
Best films of 2019 (so far) In Fabric In Fabric feels like Peter Strickland at his most free and playful, drawing as much from the British sense of humour – dry and morbid to a fault – as from Italian glamour.
Curzon Artificial Eye
Best films of 2019 (so far) The Flood "Perhaps The Flood isn’t quite the urgent, profound film a crisis of this scale deserves, but in a culture where refugees are so rarely shown any empathy in mainstream media, maybe this is the film we need right now."
Best films of 2019 (so far) Midsommar "Ari Aster's follow-up to Hereditary serves up much of the same: it’s a break-up movie wrapped up in pagan horror. It’s also bound to be one of this year’s most memorable films, proving that Aster is far from a one-hit wonder."
A24
Best films of 2019 (so far) The Lion King "The Lion King is undoubtedly a technological marvel that, much like Avatar, will come to be viewed as a milestone in special effects history, yet it’s just as interesting to see how all this innovation has been employed."
AP
Best films of 2019 (so far) Varda by Agnès "For a film that’s almost entirely narrated by Agnès Varda's own voice, it doesn’t feel driven by ego, but by pure intellectual and emotional curiosity."
Best films of 2019 (so far) Animals "Animals treats its subjects with patience and generosity. You’ll find no life lessons here. Its main characters are free to pursue their desires, to whatever end."
Best films of 2019 (so far) Blinded by the Light "Blinded by the Light offers not only a reminder of Springsteen’s lyrical genius, but of how he’s always served as a beacon for the disenfranchised."
Warner Brothers
Best films of 2019 (so far) Good Boys Lined up against some of this year’s other more heartfelt offerings, including Booksmart, Good Boys offers further proof that putting a little humanity in our comedy always gets the best results.
Best films of 2019 (so far) Hustlers "Hustlers is an electrifying response to the deluge of stories we’ve had over the years about very rich, very bad dudes. Finally, we can turn the tables on every film that’s used women, specifically strippers, as decorative accessories to drape over businessmen as they conduct their illicit backroom meetings. Or, failing that, to shake their out-of-focus tits in the background of a shot."
AP
Best films of 2019 (so far) For Sama For Sama is one of the most profoundly intimate depictions of the Syrian conflict ever put to film. It’s the push to help those on the outside process something so incomprehensible in the depth of its horrors.
Republic Film Distribution
Best films of 2019 (so far) Ad Astra The real drama here is not whether or not apocalypse can be avoided but whether Brad Pitt’s character can reconcile himself with his father and overcome his own extreme emotional repression. In other words, in spite of all the jargon and the hardware, this is an intimate family melodrama at heart. Thanks to Pitt’s performance and Gray’s delicate direction, it turns into a very moving one.
Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures
Best films of 2019 (so far) The Farewell Wrapped up in all the intricacies of immigrant identity and family politics, The Farewell is a comedy of warmth and bracing honesty. Simply put, it’s one of the best films of the year.
A24
Best films of 2019 (so far) Judy This is Renée Zellweger’s Judy. It doesn’t belong to Rupert Goold, its director. Nor does it belong to Tom Edge, its screenwriter. It’s a performance of such overwhelming force that it wrests authorship from every other hand that guided the film’s creation.
Pathé
Best films of 2019 (so far) Ready or Not As absurd and self-indulgent as Ready or Not can get, it doesn’t mess around with its social commentary. The class system is the game we never asked to play, don’t get a fair chance at, and have no hope of winning. It’s a timeless metaphor.
20th Century Fox
Best films of 2019 (so far) A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon Despite its mouthful of a title, A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon is an utter delight – proof that good storytelling and strong craft are what matters, however familiar the packaging.
Studio Canal
Best films of 2019 (so far) The Beach Bum Clearly, Harmony Korine is steered by his attraction to the theatrical, the absurd and the grimly nihilistic. The Beach Bum is all of that and absolutely none of it, too – a leisurely, neon-soaked stroll through chaos and hazy bohemia, full of slapstick and pathos. It is as much Korine’s most mature film as it is his most juvenile.
Neon/Vice
Best films of 2019 (so far) The Last Black Man in San Francisco It’s a beautiful, frightening and tragic vignette of the urban nightmare, though The Last Black Man in San Francisco isn’t really an angry film. It’s less of a rallying cry against gentrification than a rumination on the kind of pained acceptance those who suffer its effects must face.
A24
Best films of 2019 (so far) The Irishman Scorsese’s signature camerawork goes down like a glass of fine whisky, as smooth and as elegant as you’d expect. The violence arrives in short, sharp shocks. Steven Zaillian’s screenplay even nails the mobster patter, with arguments about fish, tardiness, and business shorts that feel destined to one day be quoted to death.
Netflix
Best films of 2019 (so far) Le Mans '66 The film’s greatest trick is saved for its final reel. For much of its running time, you’d be easily fooled into thinking Mangold had made a grand ode to the American dream. It’s a film about an immigrant worker who, through perseverance and toil, gains the respect of one of the richest men in the country. And then the rug is pulled right out from underneath you. Le Mans ‘66 may relish in the high life, but its final moments feel devastatingly hollow.
AP
Best films of 2019 (so far) Marriage Story The film never loses its sense of humour and absurdity. Somehow, in spite of the bleakness of the subject matter, it feels more redemptive than despairing.
Best films of 2019 (so far) The Report Adam Driver plays Jones, Annette Bening Senator Feinstein, and director Scott Z Burns captures the events in a cold, rigorously factual, and largely dispassionate manner. But that’s the point. The Report chooses to value the truth over bombastic displays of morality.
AP
Best films of 2019 (so far) Knives Out Casting an ensemble film is a little like perfecting a cocktail blend, balancing flavours until they sing together in harmony. Knives Out hits the mark here: the actors all feel well-suited to their roles and they bounce off each other with ease.
Lionsgate
The director pleaded guilty to unlawful sex with a minor in 1977 and fled the United States the following year. He has remained in exile since.
Polanski was subsequently expelled from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in 2018.
"Venice programming a new Roman Polanski movie on competition while having just two films by women there is... uhh... a look," wrote one Twitter user.
"The Venice Film Festival line-up has only two women and one Roman Polanski... yikes," someone else tweeted.
Among Venice's 21 competition titles is the Netflix-produced Panama Papers drama The Laundromat , starring Meryl Streep and Antonio Banderas, which could not run in Cannes.
Netflix will also present Marriage Story and The King , with the latter debuting out of competition.
Support free-thinking journalism and attend Independent events Hollywood productions such as Joker Ad Astra starring Brad Pitt, are also in the running.
The Venice Film Festival will run from 29 August to 7 September.
Additional reporting by agencies
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