The 79th Venice International Film Festival, organized by La Biennale di Venezia and directed by Alberto Barbera, started on the Lido di Venezia on August 31 and will run until September 10, 2022. The Festival aims to raise awareness and promote international cinema in all its forms as art, entertainment, and as an industry, in a spirit of freedom and dialogue. The guest of honor for the 79th edition is the actress and presenter Rocío Muñoz Morales, who hosts the opening and closing nights.

American actress, Academy Award (Still Alice, 2014), and Emmy winner Julianne Moore is the president of the International Jury of the Competition. Jury members also include Mariano Cohn, Leonardo Di Costanzo, Audrey Diwan, Leila Hatami, Kazuo Ishiguro, and Rodrigo Sorogoyen. The Jury of Venezia 79 awards the following official prizes to the feature films in the Competition: Golden Lion for Best Film, Silver Lion - Grand Jury Prize, Silver Lion for Best Director, Coppa Volpi for Best Actress, Coppa Volpi for Best Actor, Special Jury Prize, Award for Best Screenplay, “Marcello Mastroianni” Award for Best New Young Actor or Actress.

White Noise, based on the book by Don DeLillo, written for the screen and directed by Noah Baumbach with Adam Driver and Greta Gerwig, was the Opening Film, in Competition, at the Venetian festival. This is Baumbach’s return to the Lido; he premiered Marriage Story at the festival in 2019. The film was screened Wednesday, August 31, in the Sala Grande at the Palazzo del Cinema.

During the opening night of the 79th Venice Film Festival, iconic French actress Catherine Deneuve has been awarded the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement. “It is a joy to receive this prestigious award at the Venice Festival, which I love and have known for a long time since Belle de jour by Luis Buñuel received the Golden Lion in its day," said Catherine Deneuve “It is also an honor to be chosen for this tribute at the Film Festival that has accompanied me so often for so many movies.”

"An impressive number of movies, most of which are major international successes. An equally remarkable number of awards she has received at the world's most important festivals, plus an Oscar nomination for best actress in a leading role, a rare privilege for an artist who is not American, said Alberto Barbera regarding this award. "An indisputable talent at the service of a gift for acting, plus a sophisticated and rare beauty, attributes which have helped make her the very symbol of French cinema, a timeless diva and a true icon of the silver screen."

The other Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement went to the American director and screenwriter Paul Schrader. "Paul Schrader is a key figure of New Hollywood who, from the late 1960s on, has revolutionized the imagination, aesthetics, and language of American film," said Barbera regarding this award to the American director. "It is not an exaggeration to affirm that he is one of the most important American filmmakers of his generation, a director who is deeply influenced by European film and culture, and a stubbornly independent screenwriter who nonetheless knows how to work on commission and confidently move within the Hollywood system."

Line-up of the 79th Venice International Film Festival:

VENEZIA 79 COMPETITION
An International competition comprising a maximum of 21 feature-length films presented as world premieres.

OUT OF COMPETITION
Works of established authors, films in which the spectacular dimension is accompanied by forms of expressive or narrative originality, and documentaries.

ORIZZONTI
An international competition dedicated to films that represent the latest aesthetic and expressive trends, with special attention to debut films, young talents, indie features and lesser-known cinema.

ORIZZONTI EXTRA
A selection of up to 10 works aimed at innovating and demonstrating creative originality in the relationship with the public they are meant for.

VENICE CLASSICS
A selection of the finest recent restorations of classic films, and documentaries about cinema or individual authors of yesteryear or today.

VENICE IMMERSIVE
A maximum of 30 Immersive Projects in Virtual Reality as world-premieres or international premieres. 360 videos, 3 DOF and 6 DOF interactive works.

BIENNALE COLLEGE CINEMA
An advanced training workshop for the development and production of micro-budget works, open to teams of directors and producers from around the world.

View the program of the 79th Venice Film Festival