Venice Review: Pedro Almodovar’s Opening-Night Film ‘Parallel Mothers’

Jamie Lang Spain has selected a high profile trio of films as finalists for the country’s 2021 International Feature Oscar submission.The favorite, at least at this early stage, is Pedro Almodóvar’s “Madres paralelas,” which just saw lead Penelope Cruz take the Volpi Cup for Best Actress at the Venice Film Festival.

In shades of the gunmetal gray that has become the grading palette of choice for Serious Historical Epics — possible because arterial blood spray shows up so nice and red against it —Ridley Scott‘s starry, surprisingly engaging “Rashomon“-inflected “The Last Duel” opens on the wintry December day of the duel in question.

The talent and influence of Italian composer Ennio Morricone, who died in 2020 aged 91, is undeniable. Synonymous with Sergio Leone’s spaghetti westerns and the instantly-recognizable “wah-wah-wow” theme-tune to “The Good, The Bad and The Ugly,” the extent of his output was phenomenal at over 500 film scores.

Dear Evan Hansen is Hollywood’s newest entry on the road to reviving the musical genre. The Broadway musical by musicians and lyricist Benj Pasek and Justin Paul is coming to the big screen via Universal to see if it can capitalize on general audience approval.

Where to begin with “Freaks Out,” a Nazisploitation fantasy caper with circus trappings and a tin-ear for taste. The puzzling thing about Italian director Gabriele Mainetti’s feature set in 1943 in German-occupied Rome is that, rather than embracing tastelessness a la John Waters, it guns for earnestness despite not having a thoughtful bone in its body.

“True Things” is a “romantic” drama that is not romantic in the slightest. In the tradition of films like Catherine Breillat’s “Romance” and Adrian Lyne’s “9 ½ weeks,” the focus is on what is revealed about a female protagonist by how much she is willing to sacrifice to briefly experience passion with an unreliable yet sexy man.

Like finding a grubby, balled-up bill in your spangly g-string and uncrumpling it to discover doughy old Ben Franklin staring benignly back at you, Ana Lily Amirpour‘s third feature is a sweet, scuzzy surprise made all the sweeter/scuzzier because you don’t know quite what you did to deserve it.

“The Peacock’s Paradise” is one of the worst types of films to watch and review. Ineffectual in its style, but inoffensive in its content and execution, Laura Bispuri’s most recent directorial effort fails to move beyond the rudimentary elements that comprise the average movie.

A poetic meditation on film, history, and loss, “Three Minutes – A Lengthening” gives a glimpse into a lost world and then unpacks just how much can be learned from that brief fragment. While on a grand tour of Europe in 1938, David Kurtz, a Polish-American man, traveled to Nasielsk, the town of his birth, and brought with him a 16mm camera filled with Kodachrome, a novelty at the time.

“Why does it take so long to break up? Why does no one talk about the fact that [divorce] is endless trauma?” Jessica Chastain asks in a heartbreaking moment from HBO’s devastating marital and breakup mini-series “Scenes From A Marriage.” A modern adaptation of Swedish filmmaker Ingmar Bergman’s brutally emotionally honest 1970s series, now written, directed, and executive produced by Israeli filmmaker Hagai Levi, (“Our Boys,” “The Affair,” and “In Treatment”), this new HBO version is intimate,

There are shades of Ruben Ostlund’s “The Square”, if it were remade to target the film world, in Mariano Cohn and Gastón Duprat’s crowd-pleasing Spanish comedy “Official Competition” starring Penélope Cruz and Antonio Banderas. Controlled pacing, visual punchlines, and an insider knowledge of the varied pretensions within filmmaking make this a consistently amusing – if never downright hilarious – vehicle for the well-honed comic sides of two of Spain’s most famous exports.

Benedetta star Virginie Efira plays a woman leading a double life in drama Madeleine Collins which premiered in the Venice Days section of the Venice Film Festival today. Also doubling up in Venice by serving on the competition jury, Efira puts in a terrific performance in Antoine Barraud’s taut relationship pic that veers into thriller territory.

Ruth Wilson puts in a riveting performance in Venice Film Festival Horizons entry True Things, an impressive follow up to director Harry Wootliff’s debut Only You. Wilson and Jude Law are also among the producers for this intense story, based on the novel True Things About Me by Deborah Kay Davies.

Near the town of Cerchiara, in a valley nestled within the Pollino massif of mountains on the border between the Calabria and Basilicata regions of lushest Italy, there is a hole. It’s not the biggest hole, but at the time of its exploration, it was the second-deepest.

“A great man doesn’t seek to lead; he is called to it,” Duke Leto Atreides (Oscar Isaac) says somberly to his son Paul Atreides (Timothée Chalamet), in Denis Villeneuve’s dynastic epic space odyssey “Dune.” The Duke speaks to duty, purpose, and destiny, but the words are laced with burden and uncertainty for Paul, seemingly undecided about his future. When Villeneuve (“Sicario,” “Prisoners”) once spoke about making “Dune” as a “’Star Wars’ for adults,” he wasn’t kidding.

With “The Lost Daughter,” director Maggie Gyllenhaal wears melancholy like a second skin.

“A great man doesn’t seek to lead; he is called to it,” Duke Leto Atreides (Oscar Isaac) says somberly to his son Paul Atreides (Timothée Chalamet), in Denis Villeneuve’s dynastic epic space odyssey “Dune.” The Duke speaks to duty, purpose, and destiny, but the words are laced with burden and uncertainty for Paul, seemingly undecided about his future. When Villeneuve (“Sicario,” “Prisoners”) once spoke about making “Dune” as a “’Star Wars’ for adults,” he wasn’t kidding.

What if you’ve paid your debt to society, but the spiritual weight of what you truly owe for your past actions can never be repaid in full? Following the terrific comeback reception to “First Reformed” and the spartan, Bresson-ian transcendental style employed within, feeling good about his chances, filmmaker Paul Schrader doubles down on austere slow cinema again in “The Card Counter,” a movie about the moral balance a man can accrue.

Ramin Setoodeh Executive EditorAt the Venice Film Festival, the masks stay on, even during the standing ovation.At least that became protocol during the festival’s opening night movie, “Parallel Mothers,” on Wednesday night in Italy.Director Pedro Almodóvar and his muse Penelope Cruz didn’t so much as touch their face coverings during an enthusiastic five-minute standing ovation at the historic Sala Grande for the Spanish film.As soon as the credits rolled, Cruz leaned over and clutched

Pedro Almodovar’s Parallel Mothers had Venice Film Festival attendees on their feet in the Sala Grande this evening, giving the opening night world premiere a nine-minute standing ovation. The movie, which traces the complicated relationship of two women (Penelope Cruz and newcomer Milena Smit) who meet in a hospital room where they are going to give birth, was screened for the press this morning and has received resoundingly positive reviews.