The high cost of hotel rooms and other logistical headaches have prompted the organisers of the Venice film festival to consider moving the event from the Lido Di Venzia to Venice proper.

"We no longer want to submit to the loan-sharking and blackmailing of Lido hotels, whose prices have become unaffordable for anybody," said Franco Bernabe, the president of the Biennale di Venezia, which organises cultural events in the city including the film festival, according to the Corriere Della Serra newspaper.

Moritz de Hadeln, who on Thursday was formally confirmed in the post of the festival 's artistic director for another year, is to research the possibility, said festival spokeswoman Elena Di Giovanni.

"Don't they realise they are strangling the festival this way'" said Bernabe, a former captain of industry, who said that hotel prices on the Lido had tripled in recent years. The Lido is a sandbar only a few minutes away from the main island city and has been held there since 1932. The Arsenale, a former military installation where some festival events are already held, is suggested as a possible alternative venue.