#Venezia74 – Film Festival 2017 – The Shape of the Water -Guillermo del Toro

Photograph copyright 2017 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation

Courtesy La Biennale di Venezia

The Shape of Water

Guillermo del Toro

The Shape of Water, directed by Guillermo del Toro with Sally Hawkins, Michael Shannon, Richard Jenkins, Doug Jones, Michael Stuhlbarg, Octavia Spencer is an other-worldly fairy tale, set against the backdrop of Cold War era America circa 1962. In the hidden high-security government laboratory where she works, lonely Elisa is trapped in a life of isolation. Elisa’s life is changed forever when she and co-worker Zelda discover a secret classified experiment.

http://www.labiennale.org/en/cinema/2017

  photograph by Mathieu Young – courtesy La Biennale di Venezia

“…Love is real—absolutely real—and, like water, it is the most gentle and most powerful force in the Universe. It is free and formless until it pours into its recipient, until we let it in. Our eyes are blind. But our soul is not. It recognizes love in whatever shape it comes to us.”

Guillermo del Toro

Director

Contessanally – The Shape of the Water enjoyable love story between a mute girl and a monster 8/10

Ellen Italian Police Dog

#Venice 74 – Palazzo del Cinema – Sala Grande

Ellen is an Italian Police dog, explosive is written on her collar. She was very frisky when I met her; she was ready to go to work, keeping us save. Thank-you beautiful Labrador.

 

#Venezia74 – Film Festival 2017 - Downsizing - Alexander Payne

Photograph by ASAC courtesy La Biennale di Venezia

Downsizing

Alexander Payne

The world premiere screening of Downsizing, directed by Alexander Payne (Sideways, The Descendants, Nebraska) starring Matt Damon, Christoph Waltz, Hong Chau and Kristen Wiig was the opening film, In Competition, of the 74th Venice International Film Festival directed by Alberto Barbera and organized by the Biennale di Venezia, chaired by Paolo Baratta.

Downsizing follows the adventures of Paul Safranek (Matt Damon), an everyman from Omaha who, along with his wife Audrey (Kristen Wiig), dreams of a better life. As the world faces an overpopulation crisis, scientists develop a radical solution that can shrink humans to five inches tall. People soon discover how much further money goes in a smaller world, and with the promise of a lavish lifestyle beyond their wildest imaginations, Paul and Audrey decide to risk the controversial procedure and embark upon an adventure that will change their lives forever.

Matt Damon, Kristin Wiig, Hong Chau and Alexander Payne

 

http://www.labiennale.org/en/cinema/2017

Photograph courtesy La Biennale di Venezia

“I’m excited. Not only is it wonderful that Downsizing was asked to open Venice, but I’ve never been to the festival in my life.”

 Alexander Payne

Director

 

Photograph by ASAC courtesy La Biennale di Venezia

Waiting hours for Matt Damon

#Venezia74 - #BiennaleCinema2017 – Palazzo del cinema

Lido di Venezia

 

Contessanally – Downsizing surreal prospect and senseless  - 6/10

 

 

#Venezia74 – Film Festival 2017 – Orizzonti – Susanna Nicchiarelli – Nico, 1988

  Photograph courtesy La Biennale di Venezia

Nico, 1988

Susanna Nicchiarelli

Orizzonti Competition

Nico, 1988, is written and directed by Susanna Nicchiarelli staring Trine Dyrholm as Nico and with John Gordon Sinclair, Anamaria Marinca, Sandor Funtek, Thomas Trabacchi, Karina Fernandez, Calvin Demba. Set between Paris, Prague, Nuremberg, Manchester, the Polish countryside and the Roman seaside, Nico, 1988 is a road-movie dedicated to the last years of Christa Paffgen, known by her stage name Nico. One of Warhol’s muses, the singer of the Velvet Underground and a woman of legendary beauty, Nico lived a second life after the story known to all, when she began her career as a solo artist.  Her music is among the most original of the Seventies and Eighties, and has influenced much of the musical production that followed. The "priestess of darkness", as she was called, found her true calling after age forty, when she shook off the weight of her beauty and rebuilt her relationship with her only forgotten son. Nico, 1988 is the story of Nico's last tour with the band that accompanied her around Europe in the Eighties. It is the story of a rebirth, an artist, a mother, the woman beyond the icon.

http://www.labiennale.org/en/cinema/2017

   Photograph courtesy La Biennale di Venezia

“This is the story of Nico after Nico.”

Susanna Nicchiarelli

director

Contessanally – Dramatic beautiful Nico played brilliantly by

Trine Dryholm – 7/10

#Venezia74 - #BiennaleCinema2017 – Area Giardini

Lido di Venezia