Venice Announces Lineup on July 25; Here Are My Predictions

Its been announced that the 80th Venice Film Festival will be announcing its lineup on July 25.

This is a good time to write my first big predictions piece. It should be noted that we already have a good picture of what will be there, via leaks and intel. This year, more than others, has had unofficial confirmations coming from the trades as well.

It does look as though Woody Allen, Roman Polanski and Luc Besson will all be there — cue in the outraged op-eds. What I’m noticing though is a lineup which will likely be missing Miyazaki, Scott and Villeneuve.

Although, keep those expectations tampered, for now, I’m hearing there is a chance that Netflix brings Fincher’s “The Killer.” Don’t shoot the messenger if I’m wrong, but it seems as though they’re thinking about bringing it to the Lido. Right now, it’s a 50/50 shot.

There will surely be plenty of great films to watch again this year. I am not entirely sure what’s going on with Richard Linklater’s “Hitman,” it could hit the Lido, but intel has been very scarce when it comes to that film.

Screening out of competition will likely be Luca Guadagnino’s “Challengers,” Woody Allen’s “Coup de Chance” and Luc Besson’s “DogMan.” I’m putting “Maestro” IN competition, although, if you remember, Bradley Cooper’s “A Star is Born” was screened out of competition in 2018, so there might be a chance his latest also gets that spot.

A24 and Sean Durkin’s “The Iron Claw” has test-screened a few times already. The reactions have been mixed, but it does look more like a Venice title than Toronto — austere, moody, impenetrable.

Alexander Payne’s “The Holdovers” would be a great get for Venice, but Focus, which is handling the film, has a tight friendship with Toronto and might just skip the Lido. The same could potentially be said about Ethan Coen’s “Drive-Away Dolls,” which is also Focus.

As is customary, you’ll have 4 or 5 Italian titles in comp, this year: Garrone, Costanzo, Diritti and Castellito. Here are the 24 films that I see as having the best shot at being part of the official competition:

Michael Mann’s “Ferrari”
Roman Polanski’s “The Palace”
Bradley Cooper’s “Maestro”
Pablo Larrain’s “El Condo”
Sofia Coppola’s “Priscilla”
Andrew Haigh’s “Strangers”
Yorgos Lanthimos’ “Poor Things”
Michel Franco’s “Memory”
Bruno Dumont’s “L’Empire”
Mateo Garrone’s “The Captain”
David Michod’s “Wizards”
Bertrand Bonnello’s “The Beast”
Kiril Serebrenikkov’s “Limonov”
Ladj Ly’s “Batiment 5”
Xavier LeGrand’s “Le Successeur”
Kitty Green’s “The Royal Hotel”
Saverio Costanzo’s “Finalmente L’alba”
Emerald Fennell’s “Saltburn”
Pietro Castellito‘s “Enea”
Giorgio Diritti’s “Lubo”
Gu Xiaogang‘a “Dwelling By The West Lake”
Christos Nikou’s “Fingernails”
Kobiela’s “The Peseants”
Ethan Coen’s “Drive-Away Dolls”