For the second time, Cate Blanchett won the Best Actress award at the Venice Film Festival on September 10, 2022. The 79th edition chaired by Julianne Moore crowned the 53-year-old Australian actress for her performance as a conductor in Todd Field’s feature film, Tar. The first time she won the Volpi Cup was for I’m not There by Todd Haynes, in which she played another figure in music, Bob Dylan. “Thank you for (…) this festival which once again invites the public into the halls, it’s wonderful“said Cate Blanchett as she received her award.”I won’t be here with this award without a wonderful director, this award also belongs to Todd Field (…) a great filmmaker who knows where to put the camera every second“, she added.
To receive her prize, the dazzling Cate Blanchett chose a long black dress from Louis Vuitton. A literally imperial look for the star who is also flawless as an elf in The Lord of the Rings than as a woman on the verge of a nervous breakdown in Blue Jasmine. And she proved her comedic talent again most recently in the climate comedy Don’t look up!where she played a TV presenter insensitive to climate change alongside Leonardo DiCaprio, already her partner in the flamboyant Airman.
On the male side, Colin Farrell won the interpretation prize at the 79th Venice Film Festival on Saturday evening for his role as a tender-hearted farmer in a comedy with dark humor, The Banshees of Inisherin. In front of the camera of his compatriot Martin McDonagh (Kisses from Bruges), the 46-year-old Irishman shines in a parable about the violent end of a friendship in the bucolic setting of an isolated island in Ireland in the 1920s, during the War of Independence. The actor, absent from the Lido to receive his award, sent a video message from Los Angeles, saying to himself “Completely shocked and delighted“.
The Golden Lion of the Mostra returned to the documentary on one of the greatest contemporary photographers, Nan Goldin, whose life was marked by the dead. Signed Laura Poitras, All the Beauty and the Bloodshed is a journey through the life of the 68-year-old photographer, known for her shots of the New York underground and who saw so much death. The film follows The Event of Audrey Diwan last year.
French filmmaker Alice Diop scored twice on Saturday in Venice by winning the Grand Jury Prize and the first film prize for her first fiction, Saint Omer, inspired by a news item and the trial that followed. “I no longer have the words,” said the filmmaker, very moved, receiving her award and highlighting her feminist fight, in particular that “women of color“: “Silence will not protect us. We won’t be silent anymore“, she promised. Inspired by a true story of an infanticide trial, Saint Omer seeks to explore”the great universal question” of our “relation to motherhoode”.
All the prizes of the Venice Film Festival
Golden Lion for Best Film: All the Beauty and the Bloodshed by Laura Poitras (USA)
Silver Lion – Grand Jury Prize and Future Lion – Best First Work: Saint Omer by Alice Diop (France)
Silver Lion – Best Direction Award: Italian Luca Guadagnino for Bones and all
Best Actress Award: Australian Cate Blanchett for her role in Tar by Todd Field
Best Actor Award: Irishman Colin Farrell for his role in The Banshees of Inisherin by Martin McDonagh
Marcello Mastroianni Award for Most Promising Actor or Female: Actress Taylor Russell for her role in Bones and all by Luca Guadagnino
Special Jury Prize: Bears don’t exist by Jafar Panahi (Iran)
Best Screenplay Award: The Banshees of Inisherin by Irishman Martin McDonagh