Fan Fare

Sorry, we haven’t got the film

There have been a few technical glitches at this year’s Venice film festival, but even the most seasoned film critics were puzzled when the main press screening of Italian film “Il Seme della Discordia” (The Seed of Discord), which is vying for the Golden Lion, was cancelled on Thursday.

A statement from organisers simply said the film reel was not available for the 7 p.m. screening. It will instead be shown at 10:30 p.m.

“The Seed of Discord”, by Neapolitain director Pappi Corsicato is one of four domestic films in the main line-up, a bold choice by festival director Marco Mueller which has sparked hopes that one of Italy’s own may scoop the top prize when the awards are announced on Saturday.

Brit scoops Gucci prize in Venice

(this was posted on behalf of Silvia Aloisi, Reuters reporter in Venice) 

Britain does not have any movies in the main competition of the Venice film festival this year but it can console itself with the Gucci Group award going to one of its own.

Artist Steve Mcqueen won the top prize — given each year on the sidelines of the Lido showcase — for “Hunger”, a hard-hitting film about the final days of Bobby Sands, the IRA leader who died in jail after a hunger strike. “Hunger” had already scooped the “Camera d’Or” in Cannes earlier this year.

Festival director Marco Mueller, who is under scrutiny this year for a line-up that has disappointed many critics, said he had really wanted “Hunger” to premiere in Venice “but Cannes got there first”.

Mcqueen was up against another British nominee, London-based photographer Isaac Julien, who was nominated for his film “Derek”, written and narrated by Tilda Swinton. He also beat “Gunnin’ for That #1 Spot”, a Harlem-set documentary on high-school basketball prospects by Beastie Boys’ founding member Adam Yauch, and “Lou Reed’s Berlin” by last year’s winner Julian Schnabel.

French actress Isabelle Huppert and U.S. artist Jeff Koons were among the members of the jury, as was Mueller.

The winner was announced on Monday in a special ceremony at Venice’s Palazzo Grassi, the palace-turned-museum on the Grand Canal that hosts the contemporary art collection of the Gucci Group’s controlling shareholder, Francois Pinault.

Iranian film has Venice public fuming

Acclaimed Iranian director Abbas Kiarostami has fallen foul of the public in Venice after his latest picture “Shirin” screened at the annual film festival. While some critics were relatively kind to one of “arthouse” cinema’s leading lights, the public was less forgiving.

On the “Give Us Our Money Back!” notice board outside the festival, where people vent their spleens with small notes containing their rants/musings, “Shirin” features far more than any other film so far as Venice reaches its halfway stage.

He was slammed for being pretentious, wasting audience’s time and producing a truly boring piece of cinema. One cartoon features the drawing of a man watching the movie trying to hang himself.

“Shirin” is 92 minutes long. It is a sequence of shots of Iranian women’s faces as they watch a film which the audience never sees. Clever device? Perhaps, but many felt that 114 actresses including French star Juliette Binoche, was a little, shall we say, over the top.

Pitt gives paps early workout in Venice

The Venice Film Festival is not even underway, but the paparazzi were put through their paces in the canal city on Tuesday when Brad Pitt arrived with two of his children a day ahead of his red carpet appearance to promote “Burn After Reading”, the Coen brother’s latest movie in which he stars.

Cameramen and photographers were dispatched to the airport to greet the Hollywood heartthrob and then the water taxi chase ensued. A further “boat scrum” occurred in Venice itself, where about eight water taxis crowded around the steps leading up to the swanky Cipriani hotel for further shots of the star which, no doubt, will be touted by some of tomorrow’s newspapers as “exclusives”.

Pitt has arrived in Venice early to support a charity dinner tonight where he and George Clooney are promoting “Not On Our Watch”, which aims to raise money for and awareness of the victims of natural disasters and conflicts around the world.

There was no sign, though, of Pitt’s partner Angelina Jolie or their newborn twins, which may come as a relief to some reporters but will be bad news for the paps, for whom pictures of the “Brangelina” clan are about as big as pictures get.