Good morning: In today's edition of The Industry, we look at:
A Cover Story on the Venice Film Festival winners and a grand injustice gets righted.
In The Industry News, we look at Lionsgate’s come to Jesus moment and something not to laugh about in Late Night.
Actor Spotlight investigates an Oscar-winner's final role… on network TV. And a renowned actor, who played Satan, has a new role as an exorcist.
In Festival News a Marilyn Monroe actress talks about her crazy threesome relationship in Eden.
Indie Filmmaker Spotlight features a cinema master’s lost script and a hazy documentary.
Let’s go!
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The Venice Film Festival has come to a close, and the winners have been announced.
Pedro Almodóvar’s first English-language film, The Room Next Door, won the Golden Lion (top prize).
This is Almodóvar’s first top prize at a major film festival in his 40+ year career.
Did he need to change languages to gain recognition from the international film community? Even the Oscars awarded him with two statues, one for Best Foreign Language Film, All About My Mother (1999), and the other for Best Screenplay, Talk to Her (2002).
Almodóvar celebrated:
“It is my first movie in English, but the spirit is Spanish… Right now I'm very happy, I didn't think, I dreamed of the Golden Lion, but once you have it you become addicted to the prize.”
Here’s the synopsis for The Room Next Door:
Ingrid (Julianne Moore) and Martha (Tilda Swinton) were close friends in their youth, when they worked together at the same magazine. After years of being out of touch, they meet again in an extreme but strangely sweet situation.
Swinton, whose performances can be both bombastic (Okja) and restrained (Memoria), detailed that razor’s balance in this film:
“It's a fairy story. It’s not naturalistic—Pedro doesn’t even work with realism. He’s working with a kind of elevated tone. To know that you’re sort of on high heels all the time, to find the grounding and to have a partner that you feel so connected to—it makes it all right.”
Check out the teaser trailer here. The screamingly loud Almodóvar hues sharply contrast to the achingly silent emotions.
Sony Pictures will release on December 20th.
Here’s a breakdown of the rest of the Venice winners:
Silver Lion Grand Jury Prize - Vermiglio
Dir/Writer: Maura Delpero
Synopsis: Set in an Italian village during the Second World War.
Special Jury Prize - April (Pyramide Distribution)
Dir: Dea Kulumbegashvili
Synopsis:
Nina, an OB-GYN, faces accusations after newborn's death. Her life undergoes scrutiny during investigation. She persists in her medical duties, determined to provide care others hesitate to offer, despite risks.
Clip.
For more:
Silver Lion for Best Director - Brady Corbet, The Brutalist
The Industry cover story
Best Actress - Nicole Kidman, Babygirl
The Industry cover story
Best Actor - Vincent Lindon, The Quiet Son
The Industry cover breakdown
Full list of Venice winners can be found here.
THE INDUSTRY NEWS
A24 wins bidding war to acquire Brady Corbet’s The Brutalist for $10 M. They must have been feeling the pressure after they had back-to-back releases (Sing Sing and The Front Room) underperform. Sony Pictures Classics and Searchlight Pictures, amazingly got outbid.
This will round out A24’s Oscar push:
Sing Sing
Best Picture hopeful
A24 release date: July 12th
Babygirl
Best Actress hopeful - Nicole Kidman
A24 release date: December 25
The Brutalist
Best Picture/Best Director hopeful
Queer
Best Actor hopeful - Daniel Craig
No release date for The Brutalist or Queer has been set, but I’d expect them to play before the end of the year for Oscar eligibility.
Blumhouse reimagines Wolf Man as a story of domestic abuse. Universal Pictures is distributing the latest incarnation of this classic 1941 film.
Here’s the teaser.
Wolf Man, starring Christopher Abbott and Julia Garner, will be released on Jan 17, 2025.
Monsters in Hollywood. The cinema reboots that have dominated the release calendar over the past few years are now stretching back to the silent film era. Three new films are currently in progress:
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