Screenshot 2023-08-30 at 19.35.22

Source: La Biennale di Venezia

Liliana Cavani, Charlotte Rampling

Legendary Italian filmmaker Liliana Cavani called for greater recognition of female filmmakers at the opening ceremony for the 80th Venice Film Festival this evening (August 30).

Ninety-year-old Cavani received the honorary Golden Lion award recognising her career, which spans seven decades.

“I’m the first female person to receive this award,” said Cavani. “There are women writers and directors who are working as well as men. It’s not quite right if we don’t give them a chance to be seen.”

“I think the festival should also consider also that. I hope that this beginning will have a sequel over time,” added Cavani.

Cavani received a standing ovation upon receiving the honorary award from actress Charlotte Rampling, who she directed in 1974 drama The Night Porter.

“You could say that Liliana Cavani and I have been defined by The Night Porter,” said Rampling. “Liliana did not give us an answer; she made no attempt to demonstrate logic or to analyse; she showed us in its original, etymological, radical sense, what is monstrous. She turned her camera towards the beast, straight at it, eyes wide open.”

“Cavani has been forcing us to question the beautiful, the ugly and the unresolved,” added the actress.

No algorithms

The ceremony was hosted by Italian actress Caterina Murino, who welcomed audience members including Matteo Salvini, the right-wing Italian politician who has been deputy prime minister and minister of infrastructure and transport since October 2022.

Although not referencing the ongoing actors and writers strikes directly, Murino said of the festival that “this work cannot be delegated to algorithms and artificial intelligence, even though they are important in so many other fields.”

The evening opened with a performance of Gino Paoli’s ‘Il cielo in una stanza’ by Italian signer Malika Ayane.

An on-screen quote from Orson Welles read “Cinema has no boundary; it is a ribbon of dream”, an idea also put forward by Competition jury head Damien Chazelle at the opening press conference earlier in the day.

The ceremony also included an extended video sequence in tribute to the festival’s 80th edition, with clips from the hundreds of films to have played on the Lido in that time.

A separate video tribute to Chazelle included clips from his films Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench, Whiplash, La La Land, First Man and Babylon.

“Grazie, buona sera - that’s about as much Italian as I know,” quipped Chazelle at the ceremony. “It’s an honour beyond words in any language for me to be here. As we saw in the images from the history of this festival, it has been instrumental to the entire history of cinema.

“Thinking about the types of movies I think are at the cutting edge of this art form, that to me is what this festival is, has been, can be. I’ll leave you with - Fellini said it best - ‘Vive il cinema!’” 

The red carpet preceding the ceremony had a decidedly low-key feel, particularly following the mania for Harry Styles and Timothee Chalamet at last year’s festival. However, a several-hundred-strong crowd still lined up to catch sight of stars including Luca Guadagnino, Pierfrancesco Favino – star of opening night film Comandante – and Rampling.

Edoardo de Angelis’ Italian title Comandante opens the Competition this evening, with the festival running until Saturday, September 9.