Vanessa Redgrave To Be Feted At European Film Awards
01.09.2023 - 20:01 / variety.com
Peter Debruge Chief Film Critic Mousy and diminutive, to the point that she practically disappears beneath a frizzy bramble of brown hair, Mimosa (Rebecca Antonaci) adores movies. In “Finally Dawn,” she stumbles into one, drafted into being a featured extra on a swords-and-sandals epic shooting at Cinecittà. Doing so makes Mimosa a potential target in a meandering true-crime-adjacent period piece inspired by the death of Wilma Montesi, which plays like an Italian spin on the Black Dahlia case.
An aspiring actor, Montesi might have gone on to be a star, but instead, she was chewed up and spit out by the film industry, as countless women were. Here is the story of what might have been. Pitched somewhere between “L.A.
Confidential” and “Two Weeks in Another Town,” the film — an original idea from director Saverio Costanzo, best known for adapting Elena Ferrante’s “My Brilliant Friend” for RAI and HBO — features its share of movie stars (both as characters and as key members of its ensemble). But it’s told from an outsider’s point of view: a pinch-me-I’m-dreaming day in the life of a nobody who stumbles into the sparkling glitter globe of showbiz. In that respect, the wide-eyed Antonaci proves a good fit to play a character so diffident, her mother describes her as “docile.” The year is 1953, and Montesi’s body has just been discovered on the beach.
Vanessa Redgrave To Be Feted At European Film Awards
Refresh for latest…: Warner Bros/New Line’s The Nun II continued to conjure strong business around the globe this weekend, taking the top spot again worldwide and overseas. The sophomore session of $30.1M in 72 offshore markets brings the international box office cume to $102.3M and worldwide to $158.8M so far.
With the actors’ strike now in its 63rd day, SAG-AFTRA leaders are ramping up their rhetoric against the studio heads, accusing them in the latest issue of the SAG-AFTRA Magazine of “behaving like petty tyrants,” “would-be feudal lords” and “land barons in feudal times.”
Nick Vivarelli International Correspondent Nicola Maccanico, a former Warner Bros. and Sky Italia senior exec, has been spearheading the radical overhaul of Rome’s Cinecittà Studios since June 2021, when the government-owned facilities secured a multi-million dollar loan provided by the European Union’s post-pandemic recovery fund to upgrade and expand the iconic facilities. Under Maccanico’s watch, the studios – which now boast 20 state-of-the-art soundstages and one of Europe’s largest LED walls – have become a magnet for Hollywood productions, such as Netflix’s period soap “The Decameron” and Roland Emmerich’s gladiator series “Those About to Die,” which is still currently shooting.
Maneskin has arrived!
Penélope Cruz has secured her upcoming film. The beloved Spanish actress will star in an English-language adaptation of “The Days of Abandonment,” an Italian novel written by Elena Ferrante.
again this weekend after reportedly crashing a US couple’s wedding in Florence, Italy.The video, posted to TikTok on Tuesday, shows a man dressed in head-to-toe black as he greets the newlyweds just moments after they said “I do.” “Imagine getting a pic with Kanye West at your Italian wedding,” reads the closed caption over the footage.In the video, the mystery man can be seen asking the happy couple questions about themselves. “Of course we know,” the dashing groom exclaimed while the man pulled down the mask covering his face, still keeping his back to the camera.According to the undercover video, the hooded man seems to ask where the couple is from. “We’re from Atlanta,” the groom continued.
Guy Lodge Film Critic Though it’s become a convenient catch-all term for journalists covering the subject, the phrase “European migrant crisis” can’t help but leave a sour taste in the mouth — implying as it does that Europe, the destination for so many hard-up voyagers from variously ailing or hostile countries, is the disadvantaged party in all this. That bias carries through to the bulk of well-intended films on the matter, which tend to pick up migrants’ stories, however sympathetically, on European turf.
Isabel Coixet’s English-language adaptation of Italian author Elena Ferrante’s “The Days of Abandonment.” The deal to make the film, which is now in development, was signed before the SAG-AFTRA strike. While Cruz did not attend the Venice Film Festival, she elicited raves from critics on the Lido for her performance in Michael Mann’s “Ferrari” as the angry, lonely, grief-ravaged Laura Ferrari, emotionally estranged from her husband Enzo Ferrari (Adam Driver).
Angel Studios, the platform empowering filmmakers with full creative control to crowdfund and create, is announcing today the release of CABRINI—the second Angel Studios release from SOUND of FREEDOM Director Alejandro Monteverde. CABRINI will launch in theaters nationwide on March 8, 2024.
Nick Vivarelli International Correspondent Venice Film Festival artistic director Alberto Barbera is adamant about his decision to place six Italian movies in this year’s 23-title festival lineup. “Nobody accused the French of chauvinism because they had seven French films in competition in Cannes this year,” Barbera quipped to a snarky Italian reporter when the Venice lineup was announced in July, though he did concede, “It’s true that in the past I have not done this.” Indeed, Barbera’s previous limit on Italian movies in competition for the Golden Lion was five titles last year, which some local critics considered a stretch.
Time is a relative construct stretched to the limits of elasticity by Saverio Constanzo with the period drama “Finally Dawn.” The bloated 140-minute runtime begins at a cinema in Rome in 1953 as three women watch the final scene of a saccharine war drama, the light of the big screen coming to reveal a mother and two daughters, one donning the beauty of a Hollywood starlet and the other the beauty of a traditional Italian woman, with big blue eyes framed by thick curly hair. Venice Film Festival 2023: The 17 Most Anticipated Movies To Watch The curly-haired girl is Mimosa (Rebecca Antonaci), a shy 21-year-old used to inhabiting the uncomfortable but familiar shadow of her daintier sister, Iris (Sofia Panizzi).
The glory days of Cinecitta are evoked in Finally Dawn (Finalmente l’Alba), a sprawling story of uncertain tone – sometimes thrilled, sometimes appalled and sometimes as generally bewildered as nervous ingenue Mimosa (Rebecca Antonaci), an ordinary young woman of Rome who finds herself leading the way through this warren of a Wonderland. Cinecitta has recently revived its fortunes after a long slump, with a slow build of refurbishment and expansion, but director Saverio Costanzo leans heavily into nostalgia for times past, setting his story in the ‘50s when there were still legions of centurions marching around the studio lot and live animals awaiting their close-ups. A lion features here, roaring at passers-by. It may well be the film’s most sympathetic character.
Ellise Shafer The stars were out in Venice for Variety and the Golden Globe Awards’ party on Thursday night, featuring Chase Stokes, Kelsea Ballerini, Lukas Gage and Pablo Larraín. Presented by Iervolino and Lady Bacardi Entertainment, the event celebrated breakthrough talent and excellence in Italian filmmaking, handing out several awards under the moonlight.
Italian producer and Lido habitué Mario Gianani is at the Venice Film Festival this year with Saverio Costanzo’s drama Finally Dawn which world premieres in Competition on Friday.
Rita Ora looked stunning walking around on Thursday (August 31) Venice, Italy!
Nick Vivarelli International Correspondent Saverio Costanzo, who was last in the Venice competition in 2014 with Adam Driver-starrer “Hungry Hearts,” is back on the Lido with “Finally Dawn.” The 1950s-set film stars Lily James plays a slightly fading American diva named Josephine Esperanto, who’s shooting a swords and sandals epic at Cinecittà when the famed filmmaking facilities were known as Hollywood on the Tiber. At the studios, Esperanto intersects with a young Roman woman named Mimosa, who is auditioning as an extra and takes a shine to her innocence. A “Dolce Vita” night follows in which Esperanto, Mimosa and the Hollywood epic’s other U.S.
William Earl Variety and the Golden Globe Awards continue their tradition of festival events with an exclusive invite-only party celebrating Italian cinema and talent attending the Venice Film Festival. The event will take place on Aug.
Clayton Davis Senior Awards Editor The 50th Telluride Film Festival official lineup has been announced, revealing multiple world premieres including Emerald Fennell’s “Saltburn,” George C. Wolfe’s “Rustin,” Jeff Nichols’ “The Bikeriders” and Alexander Payne’s “The Holdovers.” In addition, the festival will pay tribute to Oscar-nominated director Yorgos Lanthimos, whose film “Poor Things” will debut Stateside after premiering at the Venice Film Festival.
Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt’s daughter Shiloh Jolie-Pitt is staying cool in the LA heat, and has been rocking a short hairstyle since December. The 17-year-old has taken the bold and beautiful new look one step closer, dying it pink. Shiloh, who has gone viral for her dancing skills, was snapped catching up with a friend for lunch at the famously expensive Erewhon in Studio City.