Venice Film Festival 2007: Early Awards
The first Queer Golden Lion for a film with a gay, lesbian, bi, transgender, etc. theme and/or characters went to Ed Radtke’s out-of-competition coming-of-age drama The Speed of Life, the story of a couple of young down-and-out Brooklyners with a penchant for stealing video cameras and then downloading their home video footage. Several subplots involve a missing father, a half-crazed old man, and a grouchy police officer.
Sleuth, which offers (at least) one homoerotic situation, won a special mention.
The City of Venice Award, given to a director from "an underdeveloped country" went to India’s Murali Nair for the drama Unni, about a high-caste Indian boy who befriends two boys of lower castes.
Brian De Palma’s Iraq war drama Redacted won the Digital Award from the Future Film Festival, as Venice’s best film using digital technologies.
Wes Anderson’s Darjeeling Limited, starring Adrien Brody, Owen Wilson, and Jason Schwartzman as three brothers on a trip through India, took home the Golden Lion Cub, an award selected by local school children.
Tim Burton has been honored with a lifetime award, and tomorrow Bernardo Bertolucci, 67, will receive a special 75th anniversary Golden Lion. (The festival officially began in 1933, but because of a long break, in actuality this is its 64th edition.)
Referring to Bertolucci, festival director Marco Mueller said that "his movies are at once a declaration of love for the cinema and a manifesto of future utopias, the ones which will be reborn from those of the past."
(I’ve tried rearranging the above sentence in different ways, but thus far I’ve been unable to understand the meaning of Mueller’s words.)
Venice Film Festival Awards – 2007
64th Venice Film Festival: Competition Line-Up
64th Venice Film Festival: Out of Competition Line-Up
Venice Film Festival 2007 – Horizons Sidebar
Queer Lion for Gay-Themed Films at the Venice Film Festival
A Golden Lion for Peter Greenaway?
Woody Allen’s CASSANDRA’S DREAM at the Venice Film Festival 2007
I’M NOT THERE: Bob Dylan Not at the Venice Film Festival 2007
SLEUTH at Venice 2007: To Remake or Not to Remake
THE GRAIN OF LIFE: Great Cinema at Venice 2007
Top Contenders for the Venice Film Festival 2007 Awards
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