Many new features at the Venice International Film Festival 2025

The festival features 21 films competing for the main prize, all sharing a common characteristic: their lengthy running times. Venice Film Festival 2025 artistic director Alberto Barbera stated: “This year’s films are all between 2 and 2.5 hours long. Including such long films in the festival program is quite a challenge.” The long running times make it difficult for the jury to evaluate the works and for public screenings. Specifically, Guillermo del Toro’s “Frankenstein” is 149 minutes long, while Ildikó Enyedi’s “Silent Friend” (pictured) is 145 minutes. In addition, many films such as “La Grazia,” “No Other Choice,” “Jay Kelly,” and “Orphan” are all longer than 130 minutes.

In the non-competitive film category, screened only at the Venice Film Festival, "Director's Diary" by veteran Russian director Aleksandr Sokurov boasts a running time of 305 minutes, or over 5 hours. Experts believe that the trend of longer films is increasing, not only at film festivals but also in commercial films. A prime example is "Avatar," where parts 1 and 2 are both over 2 hours long, and the upcoming part 3, scheduled for release in December 2025, will be over 3 hours long. Alberto Barbera suggests this is a "new international standard" as like-minded producers create longer films.

Furthermore, this year's Venice Film Festival saw an increase in both the scale and quality of documentary films. In previous festivals, there were only 6-10 documentary films, but this year there were 19. Alberto Barbera assessed that this indicates a growing segment of this genre, both in terms of quality and public interest. Accordingly, some noteworthy documentaries include: "Marc by Sofia" by Sofia about fashion designer Marc Jacobs, "Ghost Elephants" by Werner Herzog about a mysterious herd of elephants in the Angolan jungle, and "Cover-Up" by Laura Poitras and Mark Obenhaus about investigative journalist Seymour Hersh…

Another noteworthy point at this year's Venice Film Festival is the number of female directors. Of the 21 films competing, six are by female directors, showing an improvement in the number of women nominated and competing for awards. This includes the return of filmmaker Kathryn Bigelow – the first female director in history to win an Oscar with “The Hurt Locker” (2008). Kathryn Bigelow returns to Venice with “A House of Dynamite”. Other notable names on the list include Ben Hania, Fastvold, Valérie Donzelli, Ildikó Enyedi…

At this year's Venice Film Festival, films from streaming platforms are also featured. While Netflix was completely absent from the Venice Film Festival in 2024, this year the studio has three very strong contenders: Baumbach's "Jay Kelly," Kathryn Bigelow's "A House of Dynamite," and Guillermo del Toro's "Frankenstein." These works could very well become Oscar contenders in 2026. Meanwhile, Amazon MGM Studios is participating with Luca Guadagnino's "After the Hunt." Mubi is competing with four films: Sorrentino's "La Grazia," Park Chan Wook's "No Other Choice," Jarmusch's "Father Mother Sister Brother," and Nemes' "Orphan."

BAO LAM (Compiled from Screen Daily, Thevenicefest, Variety)

Source: https://baocantho.com.vn/nhieu-net-moi-o-lien-hoan-phim-quoc-te-venice-2025-a189686.html