Latest in Roman Polanski

Refresh for latest…: The 76th Venice Film Festival draws to a close tonight with the winners about to be announced from inside the Sala Grande on the Lido. It’s been another year replete with strong movies hungry for awards season attention, as well as a fair share of controversy. And, it’s anybody’s guess which way…

The Venice Film Festival draws to a close this evening, when prizes will be handed out by Lucrecia Martel's jury. It's been a hot 10 days on the Lido, and not just because the mercury was stifling throughout. We expected controversy coming in, and certainly the inclusion of Roman Polanski's An Officer And A Spy in…

EXCLUSIVE: Venice Film Festival director Alberto Barbera has had plenty to ponder in the festival’s first week. There have been strong receptions for flagship movies such as Joker, Marriage Story and Ad Astra, on-going debate over the scarcity of women in Competition and drama when jury president Lucrecia Martel had…

UPDATE: The biggest talking point ahead of and into the early days of the Venice Film Festival, Roman Polanski’s An Officer And A Spy had its official competition world premiere this evening. Inside the Sala Grande, the film was well-received with a five-minute standing ovation. That’s not a Lido record in this year…

The 76th Venice Film Festival is only one day old but has already been dominated by talk of director Roman Polanski, whose new movie An Officer And A Spy debuts in Competition tomorrow. The filmmaker won’t be at the festival or doing general press but he has given a strikingly candid, wide-ranging interview for the…

Venice Film Festival jury president Lucrecia Martel has clarified comments she made regarding Roman Polanski's competition film An Officer And A Spy during today’s opening press conference, saying this evening they “were deeply misunderstood.” Speaking to the press corps through a translator earlier today, the…

The Venice Film Festival is getting underway today, kicking off with the world premiere of Hirokazu Kore-eda’s The Truth. However, before the red carpet rollout this evening, there was some spirited discussion — and a bit of dissension in the ranks — at the annual opening press conference. The panel, led by Venice…

A few years ago, a politically charged movie starring and directed by Nate Parker, and championed by Spike Lee, would have all but walked into the Toronto Film Festival. Not this year. The cultural landscape has been radically and vitally reshaped by the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements. As part of that reshaping, a…

To Quentin Tarantino, the year 1969 represented a moment of magic and turmoil in Hollywood and, being Tarantino, he determined to make a movie exploring it. He was, in fact, only 6 years old in 1969; as a result, his “take” on that year inevitably poses a challenge to those of us who'd actually lived through it. This…

The Venice Film Festival has soared in recent years but the 2019 lineup could provoke the festival’s biggest polemic yet after artistic director Alberto Barbera revealed a 21-strong competition selection featuring only two women directors and a place for contentious filmmaker Roman Polanski. Statistically, two women…

Over the past few years, the Venice Film Festival has become a magnet for awards-season hopefuls, having hosted world premieres of three of the past five Best Picture Oscar winners. This year again, there is no shortage of big-ticket titles that we’re likely to be talking about for the next six months. In what’s…

EXCLUSIVE: With Cannes in the rear-view mirror, film industry attention is now turning to the autumn festivals and what titles are shaping up as the ones we’ll be talking about throughout awards season. Having steadily cemented its status as the go-to fall launchpad for awards hopefuls, including three of the last…