La La Land, BabylonAnd whiplash Director Damien Chazelle will lead the international jury for the 80th Venice International Film Festival, which was unveiled Friday.
Chazelle, a regular at the Lido, premiered both La La Land and the Neil Armstrong biopic First husband at competition in Venice.
“Every year, this city of the arts, of Tintoretto and Titian and Veronese, becomes a city of cinema for 10 days, and I am humbled and delighted to be invited to lead this year’s jury,” Chazelle said in a statement. “I can’t wait to discover a new crop of great films at the 80th Venice Film Festival.”
French director Alice Diop (Saint Omer, We) will lead the Luigi De Laurentiis jury that judges the best first film at this year’s festival, while Italian Jonas Carpignano (A Chiara, A cimbra), will chair the jury for Venice’s main sidebar, the Orizzonti (Horizons) section. Saint Omer, Diop’s feature debut, won the Luigi De Laurentiis Prize in Venice last year. The searing courtroom drama also earned her the Grand Jury Prize Silver Lion.
Diop said it was “a great honour(s) and a great joy” to have been chosen to preside over the debut film jury. “I’m happy to pass the baton this year and work to bring a new voice to the cinematic landscape that the Venice Festival has always wanted to renew.”
Carpignano has presented most of his films at Cannes, including Mediterraneanwhich was shown on Week of the criticsAnd A Chiara, a Director’s Fortnight entry. In accepting his role as president of the Orizzonti jury, he said he was very grateful to the Venice Film Festival for this privilege. Year after year, Orizzonti’s rich and daring selection offers us a deep immersion in the world of cinema. I can’t wait to live the emotions and experience the diverse realities that we will get to know in the theaters on the Lido. To have the opportunity to see some of the best films of the year in one of the most beautiful places in the world is something very special.”
The 80th Venice International Film Festival runs from August 30 to September. 9.
