August can be a dreary month for Hollywood glamour, but the Venice Film Festival is on the horizon to kick off the busy fall film festival season in style. <\/p>\n
There will be plenty of stars gracing the red carpets when the 83rd edition of the festival<\/a> kicks off Wednesday on the Lido: Noel and Liam Gallagher, Robert Pattinson, Rooney Mara, George Clooney and Pen\u00e9lope Cruz are among those expected to attend. Some of the films may even become Oscar nominees.<\/p>\n But the mood feels a little different this year. There will always be a spotlight for the Hollywood contingent and the awards hopefuls posing on boats and docks in designer duds. Yet, in a lineup featuring Pattinson as \u201cTo Catch a Predator\u201d host Chris Hansen, Dakota Johnson as Marilyn Monroe, Guy Pearce as Rupert Murdoch and Clooney as, well, himself (he\u2019s getting a lifetime achievement award<\/a>, as is Ellen Burstyn), it\u2019s possible that much of the attention will be on a man who (probably) won\u2019t be there: Elon Musk<\/a>.<\/p>\n Docs feature Musk, Russia and Gaza<\/p>\n Alex Gibney\u2019s nearly four-hour documentary about the world\u2019s richest man has been in the works for almost four years. The Oscar-winner wasn\u2019t sure about taking it on at first, but a good friend convinced him it would be a worthy portrait of 21st-century power \u2014 and this was before the 2024 presidential campaign and DOGE<\/a>.<\/p>\n When the documentary was announced, Musk called it a \u201chit piece\u201d on social media. Gibney replied, \u201cHow would you know?\u201d<\/p>\n In fact, Gibney told The Associated Press he started off as a kind of admirer \u2014 as well as a Tesla owner \u2014 and sincerely wanted to talk to Musk for the film.<\/p>\n \u201cUltimately, he didn\u2019t want to talk to me,\u201d Gibney said. \u201cBut then you start, you know, digging into the facts and you follow them where they lead. And where they led, for me, was to a place that upended the myth, I would say, of Elon Musk as a kind of modern Leonardo da Vinci \u2026 I think that the news in this film is that Musk isn\u2019t an inventor. He\u2019s a confidence man.\u201d<\/p>\n The filmmakers talked to hundreds of people on and off the record to compile a sweeping picture of the Tesla and SpaceX CEO who, Gibney said, is not dissimilar to the guys at Enron or Elizabeth Holmes<\/a>. He was most surprised by how many people seemed to be afraid to be on camera talking about Musk \u2014 even his admirers wanted permission first.<\/p>\n \u201cI thought, wow, for such a big and powerful person, that seems awfully weak,\u201d Gibney said.<\/p>\n But while it\u2019s a \u201cdark and dangerous topic,\u201d Gibney said, the film is also a \u201cfun ride.\u201d<\/p>\n The same could be said of \u201cMy Undesirable Friends: Part II \u2014 Exile,\u201d in which Julia Loktev continues her sprawling portrait of independent Russian journalists after the invasion of Ukraine.<\/p>\n \u201cYou see this group of young, very young journalists who\u2019ve just fled their country, like, on a few hours\u2019 notice. They had the choice of, you know, stop reporting the truth about the war, which didn\u2019t seem like a choice at all, or go to prison, or leave the country so they can keep telling the truth,\u201d Loktev said. \u201cIt was a question of how long do you keep following? Because this takes place over four years. And over that time, exile becomes, of course, indefinite.\u201d<\/p>\n Similar to the first film, Part II runs nearly six hours. But, she said, \u201cI hear it goes by easy.\u201d<\/p>\n The conflict in Gaza will also take center stage in the documentary \u201cNAZA,\u201d a late addition to the competition,<\/a> from two of the filmmakers behind the Oscar-winning \u201cNo Other Land.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n Unlike last year, no large-scale protests are planned, but the group Venice4Palestine did call on the festival to \u201csuspend all agreements with entities and institutions linked to the Israeli government.” It also asked that the Palestinian flag be flown throughout.<\/p>\n Hollywood eyes awards in Venice<\/p>\n Part of the intrigue of Venice is how it might play into the Oscar race \u2014 it\u2019s usually good for a best picture nominee or two. <\/p>\n Martin McDonagh\u2019s \u201cWild Horse Nine,\u201d starring John Malkovich and Sam Rockwell as 1970s CIA agents, seems like a promising candidate after his last two films debuted at Venice and went on to nominations. \u201cThe Father\u201d filmmaker Florian Zeller returns with \u201cBunker,\u201d a psychological thriller with Cruz and Javier Bardem. Danny Boyle looks at a turning point in tabloid media in \u201cInk.\u201d And there’s much curiosity around Lance Oppenheim\u2019s \u201cPrimetime,\u201d for Pattinson\u2019s performance and for its examination of reality television culture in the early 2000s. <\/p>\n Japanese filmmaker Hirokazu Kore-eda is also debuting \u201cLook Back,\u201d about two small-town girls who aspire to be manga artists. And Korean auteur Lee Chang-dong examines themes of labor and freedom through two married couples in \u201cPossible Love.\u201d<\/p>\n This is also a year in which big Hollywood hasn\u2019t needed the sheen of the international film festival. Cannes was bereft of a big blockbuster, and the industry went on to have one of its highest-earning summers ever. The reigning best picture winner, \u201cOne Battle After Another,\u201d<\/a> skipped festivals entirely.<\/p>\n Venice might have more Hollywood films than Cannes did, but following several years in which fates might have been prematurely decided for both would-be contenders, like \u201cAfter the Hunt\u201d<\/a> and \u201cThe Smashing Machine,\u201d<\/a> and blockbusters like \u201cJoker: Folie \u00e0 Deux,\u201d<\/a> it too seems a bit more muted \u2014 at least on paper. <\/p>\n Venice fails in its pledge to women<\/p>\n And then there is the subject of women, specifically those behind the camera. There is only one in the main competition: Danish-Egyptian director May El-Toukhy. The same thing happened in 2018, prompting the festival that year to sign a pledge to have at least half of the films in competition be directed by women by 2020, which they have yet to achieve. <\/p>\n Adding more insult to injury is the fact that Maggie Gyllenhaal<\/a>, whose first film \u201cThe Lost Daughter\u201d<\/a> won Venice’s best screenplay prize in 2021, is presiding over a jury which includes Kaouther Ben Hania, whose film \u201cThe Voice of Hind Rajab\u201d won the Silver Lion last year<\/a> when there were six female-directed films in the competition.<\/p>\n