Venice Film Festival Lineup Announced – Updating Live

Refresh for latest…: The lineup for the 81st Venice Film Festival is being unveiled this morning from the Library of the Historical Archive of La Biennale. Making the announcement are La Biennale President Pietrangelo Buttafuoco and Venice Film Festival Artistic Director Alberto Barbera. Scroll down to see the full list of titles which will be updated as they are revealed.

After taking place last year amid the SAG-AFTRA strike, Venice this year is expected to be a much starrier affair. Serving as a key launchpad for awards season and a prime media opportunity for talent, the world’s oldest film festival should be upping the glamour quotient again with scuttlebutt pointing to such movies as Todd Phillips’ Joaquin Phoenix/Lady Gaga-starrer Joker: Folie à Deux from Warner Bros making the cut. Phillips’ first Joker wowed at the fest in 2019, going on to scoop the Golden Lion.

Also rumored to be in the lineup are Pablo Larrain’s Maria Callas biopic, Maria, starring Angelina Jolie as the legendary chanteuse. Luca Guadagnino could mark a return to the Lido with Queer, based on William S Bourroughs’ novel and starring Daniel Craig. We’re also hearing George Clooney/Brad Pitt thriller Wolfs from Apple has a shot at a slot as does Pedro Almodovar’s first English-language feature, The Room Next Door, starring Julianne Moore and Tilda Swinton. There has also been speculation about the Johnny Depp-directed Modi, with Al Pacino.

Already confirmed is Tim Burton’s Beetlejuice Beetlejuice which will open the proceedings out of competition on August 28. The Warner Bros title is the sequel to Burton’s classic 1988 supernatural comedy and stars Michael Keaton, Winona Ryder, Catherine O’Hara, Justin Theroux and Monica Bellucci, with Jenna Ortega and Willem Dafoe. Also previously set are the opening films of the Horizons and Horizons Extra sections, Nonostante from Valerio Mastandrea and September 5 by Tim Fehlbaum, respectively

Peter Weir and Sigourney Weaver have been tapped to receive Lifetime Achievement awards, and Isabelle Huppert is jury president this year. The festival runs from August 28-September 7.

Check back as we update the list of films announced today:

VENEZIA 81 COMPETITION

OUT OF COMPETITION

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, dir: Tim Burton

HORIZONS EXTRA

September 5, dir: Tim Fehlbaum