The absence of the major studios will shape this year’s programme at the Venice Film Festival, whose 83rd edition will take place from 2 to 12 September. And this is not the first time this has happened in 2026: the Cannes Film Festival also had no films produced by the majors in competition, with only independent American productions — James Gray’s Paper Tiger and Ira Sachs’ The Man I Love. Returning to the Lido, Paul Schrader will screen out of competition with The Basics of Philosophy, starring Jack Huston and Sofia Boutella, while the official competition will feature Lance Oppenheim with Primetime, starring Robert Pattinson, and Casey Affleck with the gothic Company.
83rd Venice Film Festival Competition
The official competition will allow us to see the new film from Danny Boyle, Ink, arriving courtesy of Netflix, with Jack O’Connell (’71) as the editor of The Sun, Guy Pearce as Robert Murdoch and Claire Foy as Jules Davies. The film, which will open the festival, was written by James Graham (Dear England), whose stage play was nominated for a Tony Award, and tells the story of the tycoon’s acquisition of the newspaper in an attempt to bring down its rival, The Mirror.
From Asia, South Korean filmmaker Lee Chang-dong has been selected with Possible Love, eight years after Burning (2018), while the prolific and familiar Japanese filmmaker Hirokazu Kore-eda will present Look Back, after premiering Sheep in the Box at the most recent Cannes Film Festival.
A bit of light (Ali Asgari, 2026).
A Bit of Light, by Iranian director Ali Asgari, whose short film The Baby competed at the festival in 2014, enters the official competition as a co-production between Iran, Switzerland, Italy, Canada and Turkey. Starring Misagh Zareh, Sadaf Asgari, Forouzan Jamshidnejad, Ramtin Daghigh and Mina Rahimzadeh, the film follows an Iranian doctor who, after being arrested and suspended from his job, loses faith in the future and wishes to end his life.
Martin McDonagh also returns to Venice after The Banshees of Inisherin, which won Best Screenplay and Best Actor in 2022 and went on to receive nine Academy Award nominations. His new film, Wild Horse Nine, arrives at the Lido with its cast: Sam Rockwell, Parker Posey, Steve Buscemi and John Malkovich. The film follows CIA agents Chris and Lee as they face a mission that puts their trust to the test, taking them from Santiago to Easter Island during the events of 1973 in Chile.
One of the attractions of the Competition will be Lance Oppenheim’s fiction debut, Primetime, starring Robert Pattinson, recently seen in The Drama and The Odyssey. In a new kind of role, the film casts him as Chris Hansen in 2006, when To Catch a Predator made television history by catching paedophiles with the help of the police and a group of online decoys.
May el-Toukhy, the Danish director known for The Crown (2019) and Queen of Hearts (2016), who is also putting the finishing touches to a film about Karen Blixen, competes with Woman Unknown, in which Marie, a former housekeeper, plans an extravagant dinner to celebrate her engagement to the family patriarch, during which her hidden past will be revealed.
Succedera questa notte (Nani Moretti, 2026).
Italian Cinema
The Italian presence at this year’s Venice Film Festival will be particularly strong, with five directors competing for the Golden Lion, a selection that also serves to highlight the gender gap in an edition in which only one woman is competing in the Official Selection. Veteran filmmaker Nanni Moretti will premiere a romantic comedy, Succederà Questa Notte, starring Louis Garrel.
Marco Bechis, the Argentine director who became a political refugee in Italy and is remembered for Garage Olimpo (1999), presents Regreso a Buenos Aires, a political film co-written with Vijaya Bechis Boll. Andrea Pallaoro, who won the award for Best Italian Film in 2022 with Monica, directs the love story The Echo Chamber, in which the boundaries between presence and absence, care and dependence, desire and control gradually blur until they dissolve altogether. Susan Sarandon, Luca Marinelli and Alicia Vikander star in a film based on a story by Bernardo Bertolucci.
Edoardo De Angelis, whose Comandante opened the Festival in 2023, returns with the feature film Il fuoco che ti porti dentro, a family drama that puts the past into perspective, starring Tommaso Ragno and Valeria Scalera. Finally, the Italian contingent includes its youngest filmmaker, Paolo Strippoli, who competes with L’estranea. The Apulian director portrays how, in Italy’s happiest village, a troubled teacher investigates gatherings where local residents heal themselves by embracing a teenage boy. His attempt to save him uncovers the truth behind their happiness.
The out-of-competition closing film on 12 September will be Dio ride, written and directed by Giovanni Veronesi (Manuale d’amore), starring Pierfrancesco Favino, Silvio Orlando, Alma Noce, Francesco Gheghi, Maurizio Lombardi, Paolo Rossi and Carlo Cecchi.
On the other hand, Laura Poitras will premiere a short film made with Rachel Mueller, They’re Here, featuring previously unseen footage of the protests against Trump that took place in Minnesota in response to ICE raids.
Jury and Tributes
The Honorary Golden Lion will be presented to two American actors, George Clooney and Ellen Burstyn, in recognition of their careers. Meanwhile, the Official Competition jury, chaired by Maggie Gyllenhaal, will also include Kaouther Ben Hania, Daniel Blumberg, Francesco Casetti, Xavier Giannoli, Shahrbanoo Sadat and Johnnie To. The American actress will also premiere her tribute to Marilyn Monroe on the centenary of her birth, a short film titled Flesh Impact, starring Dakota Johnson and Ellen Burstyn.
Venice Open
This out-of-competition section will feature films directed by some of the most prestigious filmmakers, many of whom are regular contenders in the Official Competition sections of major festivals, including Giovanni Veronesi, Gianni Amelio, Lav Diaz, Mario Martone, Paul Schrader and Kornél Mundruczó. Also screening out of competition will be Wim Wenders, with his documentary about Swiss architect Peter Zumthor.
In the “Films About Films” subsection, the director of The Dreamers will also be present on the Lido through Luca Guadagnino, who, instead of the anticipated film with OpenAI Artificial, will present his extensive, long-gestating seven-hour documentary, Joie de Vivre, about the controversial filmmaker. Before the screening, he will also receive the Cartier “Glory to the Filmmaker” Award. The section will likewise premiere Sophie Fiennes’s film about philosopher Slavoj Žižek — in which he guides us through cinema, music and the media while exposing utopian illusions — titled The Pervert’s Guide to Utopias, as well as Walter Fasano’s documentary about Nino Rota, Nino — Un Film Su Nino Rota.
The non-fiction subsection will also include What Love Builds, directed by Russell Crowe; Shumei — The Living Legacy of Kabuki, by Takashi Miike; Imperium, by Sergei Loznitsa; The Road to Jericho, by Amos Gitai; and Biografia de Jorge Luis Borges, by Mariano Llinás (Argentina, 1985).
Competition
Ink (Danny Boyle)
Company (Casey Affleck)
A Bit Of Light (Ali Asgari)
Ritorno A Buenos Aires (Marco Bechis)
Un Bon Petit Soldat (Stephane Brize)
Il Fuoco Che Ti Porti Dentro (Edoardo De Angelis)
Woman Unknown (May el-Toukhy)
Bucking Fastard (Werner Herzog)
A Place To Heal (Cedric Kahn)
Dau (Ilya Khrzhanovsky)
Look Back (Hirokazu Koreeda)
Possible Love (Lee Chang-Dong)
Wild Horse Nine (Martin McDonagh)
Succederà Questa Notte (Nanni Moretti)
Primetime (Lance Oppenheim)
The Echo Chamber (Andrea Pallaoro)
Un Peu Avant Minuit (Nicolas Pariser)
L’Estranea (Paolo Strippoli)
Mr. Nelson, Did You Kill People? (Shinya Tsukamoto)
Bunker (Florian Zeller)
Orizzonti
La Ragazza Con La Leica (Alina Marazzi)
The Burning Giants (Phuttiphone Aroonpheng)
What Belongs To Others (Grzegorz Debowski)
Una Storia (Anna Foglietta)
La Citta Dei Vivi (Edoardo Gabbriellini)
Moragheb (Mohsen Gharaei)
Too Much Sugar (Robert Greene)
The Difficult Bride (Rubaiyat Hossain)
La Maison Du Vent (Auguste Bernard Kouemo Yanghu)
I Figli Della Scimmia (Tommasco Landucci)
A Day In The Life Of Jo: Chapter Phaedra (Jacqueline Lentzou)
Oasis (Jannis Lenz)
Until The Day Ends (Jelena Maksimovic)
La Moula (Jerome Pierrat)
Lovers In The Blue Night (Anuparna Roy)
Un Détour Par Diane (Ann Sirot, Raphael Balboni)
The Color Of The Sun ( Xavier Tera)
Eklipse (Manuel Wetscher)
Big Little Things (Michelle Zhou)
Venice Open — Out Of Competition, Fiction
Dio Ride (Giovanni Veronesi)
Nessum Dolore (Giani Amelio)
Let Us Through, Dear Ancestors (Lav Diaz)
Father Joe (Barthelemy Grossmann)
Scherzetto (Mario Martone)
Place To Be (Kornel Mundruczo)
No Paradise If You Are Killed By A Woman (Halkawat Mustafa)
Arrested Memory (Sabu)
The Basics Of Philosophy (Paul Schrader)
Un Bon Avocat (Tristan Seguela)
Jupiter (Alexandre Smia)
Venice Open — Out Of Competition, Film on Films
Juso Per Ferie (Karen Di Porto)
Nino — Un Film Su Nino Rota (Walter Fasano)
The Pervert’s Guide To Utopias (Sophie Fiennes)
Joie De Vivre (Luca Guadagnino)
Twist And Shoot Mister Suzuki (Yves Montmayeur)
Intermission (Yonfan)
Venice Open — Out Of Competition, Non-Fiction
Be Brave (Francesco Carrozzini)
What Love Builds (Russell Crowe)
Burgundy (Michael Dweck, Gregory Kershaw)
Musk (Alex Gibney)
The Road To Jericho (Amos Gitai)
Citizen Osama (Ahmed Hassouna)
Union Town (Barbara Kopple)
Holy Wood Dust (Victor Kossakovsky)
Letters From The Silenced Country (Andrei Kutsila)
Biografia De Jorge Luis Borges (Mariano Llinás)
My Undesirable Friends: Part 1 — Exile (Julia Loktev)
Boatbuilders (Luke Lorentzen)
Imperium (Sergei Loznitsa)
Shumei — The Living Legacy Of Kabuki (Takashi Miike)
Queer Edward II (Theo Rollason)
Oasis: Don’t Look Back In Anger (Dylan Southern, Will Lovelace)
Dust (Tsai Ming-Liang)
Everest: The Other Side (Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi, Jimmy Chin)
From Inside Out — The Architecture Of Peter Zumthor (Wim Wenders)
Venice Open — Out Of Competition, Series
Peccato (Valerio Vestoso)
Venice Open — Out Of Competition, Short Films
Flesh Impact (Maggie Gyllenhaal)
Wild Asparagus (Avi Mograbi)
They’re Here (Laura Poitras, Rachel Lauren Muller)
Special Screening
Dai Nostri Inviati (Giuseppe Giannotti, Enrico Salvatori, Nicoletta Berardi)
Venice Spotlight
Sumo: Spirit Weighs Nothing (Erik Shirai)
Conversations With The Sea (Muayad Alayan)
Hombre Al Agua (Gael Garcia Bernal)
Serpenti (Roberto De Paolis Maino)
Furies (Rami Kodeih)
Guria (Levan Koguashvili)
Ground Floor (Gabor Reisz)
Eu Contez (Alina Serban)
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