Venice 2008 - Official Competition
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21 titles
- DirectorDarren AronofskyStarsMickey RourkeMarisa TomeiEvan Rachel WoodA faded professional wrestler must retire, but finds his quest for a new life outside the ring a dispiriting struggle.
- DirectorAleksey German Jr.StarsMerab NinidzeChulpan KhamatovaAnastasiya ShevelyovaIn 1961, a Soviet medical officer is conflicted about his position overseeing the health of future cosmonauts.
- DirectorHaile GerimaStarsAaron ArefeAbiye TedlaTakelech BeyeneThe Ethiopian intellectual Anberber returns to his native country during the repressive totalitarian regime of Haile Mariam Mengistu and the recognition of his own displacement and powerlessness at the dissolution of his people's humanity and social values. After several years spent studying medicine in Germany, he finds the country of his youth replaced by turmoil. His dream of using his craft to improve the health of Ethiopians is squashed by a military junta that uses scientists for its own political ends. Seeking the comfort of his countryside home, Anberber finds no refuge from violence. The solace that the memories of his youth provide is quickly replaced by the competing forces of military and rebelling factions. Anberber needs to decide whether he wants to bear the strain or piece together a life from the fragments that lie around him.
- DirectorPupi AvatiStarsSilvio OrlandoFrancesca NeriEzio GreggioIn pre-war Bologna, Michele Casali's teenage daughter Giovanna kills her best friend out of jealousy. Deemed mentally unfit, she is committed to a psychiatric hospital.
- DirectorPatrick-Mario BernardPierre TrividicStarsDominique BlancPeter BonkeCyril GueïAnne-Marie leaves Alex. Unlike him, who would like to lead a real married life, she wants to protect her freedom. They split up without any problems and continue to see one another. However, when Anne-Marie finds out that Alex has a new woman, she is madly jealous. She plunges into a troubling world that is full of signals and threats.
- DirectorGuillermo ArriagaStarsCharlize TheronJohn CorbettJosé María YazpikA drama with a two-tiered storyline concerning a mother and daughter who try to form a bond after the young woman's difficult childhood.
- DirectorTakeshi KitanoStarsTakeshi KitanoKanako HiguchiMakoto ArakiMachisu is a painter. He never had the success he thinks he is entitled to. Regardless of this, he always remains trying to be successful. His wife Sachiko keeps supporting him, despite all setbacks.
- DirectorMarco BechisStarsClaudio SantamariaAlicélia Batista CabreiraChiara CaselliWhen a tribe of indigenous Guarani Indians attempts to re-inhabit their ancestral land, which lies on the border of a wealthy landowner's fields, tensions escalate.
- DirectorKathryn BigelowStarsJeremy RennerAnthony MackieBrian GeraghtyDuring the Iraq War, a Sergeant recently assigned to an army bomb squad is put at odds with his squad mates due to his maverick way of handling his work.
- DirectorBarbet SchroederStarsBenoît MagimelLika MinamotoGen ShimaokaThe writer and college professor, Alexandre Fayard, researches and gives lectures about the gruesome literary work of the mysterious Japanese writer Shundei Oe, considered by him to be the master of manipulation. In his underground detective novels, evil always prevails and Shundei Oe has never allowed anyone to see his face. His only image available is a frightening picture on the back of his best-sellers. Alex travels to Kyoto to promote his successful detective story that follows the same style of the Shundei Oe but with a positive message instead. He meets with his publisher, Ken Honda, from the publishing house Hakubunkan. While in an interview in a TV show, Alex receives a phone call from Shundei Oe that advises him to return to Paris, and Alex believes it is a marketing strategy of Ken. Then Alex and Ken go to a tea house where he meets the Masochist geisha Tamao, and Alex has a crush on her. Tamao discloses to Alex that she knows Shundei Oe and his real name is Hichiro Irata; further they were lovers when she rejected his proposal many years ago. From this moment on, Hichiro Irata loathed her and vanished. When she got pregnant by the wealthy and powerful business man Ryuji Mogi, Shundei Oe returned and stalked her. Alex decides to help Tamao and Ryuji Mogi against the menace of the deranged writer, and his mind is blurred between fiction and reality in dreadful nightmares.
- DirectorTariq TeguiaStarsKader AffakIna Rose DjakouAhmed BenaïssaLiving almost as a recluse, the topographer Malek accepts a job in a region of western Algeria at the insistence of his friend Lakhdar. Malek arrives at the base camp previously used by a team, but decimated by fundamentalists. A young shepherd observes him from afar; several men, some armed, approach and question his being there. Having previously run from Islamist terrorism, these farmers decided to return to their village. At dusk, the local police arrive for a routine visit. After the police have left, Malek is invited by the villagers to a makeshift party. During the night a series of explosions are heard. At dawn, Malek begins the first topographical readings, surveys the area surrounding the base camp and measures distances. During the night, again his sleep is disturbed by powerful explosions. The next morning, Malek sees a crowd along the edges of the mined field. On his return to the base camp, he discovers a young woman hiding in a corner of the Saharan hut. She's an African woman and won't give her name. Lakhdar arrives at the site, to find that both she and Malek have disappeared. At first, the two runaways head north, towards the Moroccan frontier which is the route to reach the Spanish enclave of Mellila. But the young woman doesn't want to flee to Europe; she's exhausted and wants to return home. With her finger, she traces the itinerary on Malek's maps, an interminable diagonal towards the southeast, the route to Tchad - towards the desert, towards a point of mutual disappearance.
- DirectorChristian PetzoldStarsBenno FürmannNina HossHilmi SözerThe dishonorably discharged Afghanistan veteran Thomas returns to his home village of Jerichow. Ali, a local Turkish-German businessman, owner of a snack-bar chain, hires him as a driver. That's when Thomas meets Laura, his Turkish boss's young and attractive wife. A classic love triangle is born, unfolding in desolate northeast Germany, where thick forests suddenly end on cliffs overlooking the Baltic Sea. Caught between guilt and freedom, between passion and reason, the protagonists have no hopes for fulfillment of their dreams.
- DirectorSemih KaplanogluStarsMelih SelcukBasak KöklükayaRiza AkinYusuff has a hard time defining his adulthood. In one hand, there are his mother's expectations while on the other hand his passions.
- DirectorFerzan ÖzpetekStarsIsabella FerrariValerio MastandreaValerio BinascoA jealous and violent bodyguard can't accept his ex-wife's abandonment.
- DirectorNelson Lik-wai YuStarsAnthony Chau-Sang WongJoe OdagiriDomingos AntonioYuda, a feared Chinese outlaw, and his adopted son Kirin, an impulsive young dreamer, together rule the pirated goods racket in an ultra-liberal Brazilian metropolis. The magnate and his heir control all of Liberdade, from rival gangs to street hawkers, corrupt politicians to erotic dancers. But an empire that takes years to build can also crumble to the ground with one fatal mistake. A conspiracy between politicians and the mafia begins to threaten Yuda's power. Little by little, he loses control of his business and is ultimately arrested. Kirin struggles to re-conquer his father's honor, fighting this city's wars singlehandedly. But Yuda, tired of the bloodshed and feeling the weight of his years, abandons his son, falsifies his own death and returns to the jungle in a last attempt to put an end to his criminal life. Escaping from a complex maze of violence, Kirin sets out to find his father. In the mysterious jungle, father and son both have to wipe the slate of their past clean. Only in the end will Kirin discover the ultimate answer to the search for his own destiny.
- DirectorHayao MiyazakiStarsCate BlanchettMatt DamonLiam NeesonA five-year-old boy develops a relationship with Ponyo, a young goldfish princess who longs to become a human after falling in love with him.
- DirectorJonathan DemmeStarsAnne HathawayRosemarie DeWittDebra WingerA young woman who has been in and out of rehab for the past ten years returns home for the weekend for her sister's wedding.
- DirectorPappi CorsicatoStarsAlessandro GassmannCaterina MurinoMartina StellaA woman married to a fertilization firm representative discovers that she is pregnant the same day she discovers that her husband is sterile.
- DirectorMamoru OshiiStarsRinko KikuchiRyô KaseShôsuke TaniharaThe Kildren, a group of eternally young fighter pilots, experience the sudden loss of innocence as they battle the enemy in astonishing dogfights above the clouds.
- DirectorWerner SchroeterStarsPascal GreggoryBruno TodeschiniÉric CaravacaA group of people try to flee from a dictatorship government.
- DirectorAmir NaderiStarsMark GreenfieldNancy La ScalaZach ThomasThe film takes place away from the glittering strip of mega casinos, but the greed of Sin City is just as pervasive on the desert outskirts. This is where a happy family learns of a forgotten fortune that may be buried beneath their home. Their lives are turned upside down. A sophisticated study of just how far people are able and willing to go if faced with the tempting prospect of easily acquired wealth.