The 81st edition of the Venice Film Festival has begun, with major Hollywood films and stars arriving in Italy.

Some of Hollywood’s biggest stars are getting ready to descend on the Venice Film Festival this week, from George Clooney and Angelina Jolie to Lady Gaga, Brad Pitt, Nicole Kidman and Joaquin Phoenix.

The second part of Kevin Costner’s “Horizon: An American Saga" will have its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival in September, organizers said Wednesday.

Bradley Cooper’s Leonard Bernstein drama “Maestro,” Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla Presley movie, Michael Mann’s “Ferrari,” David Fincher’s “The Killer” and Ava DuVernay’s “Origin” will be making their world debuts at the Venice International Film Festival this fall.

The Venice Film Festival is serving up one of the year’s buzzier films as its opening night selection in Luca Guadagnino’s “Challengers.”.

In addition to opening this month’s Venice Film Festival, Noah Baumbach’s adaptation of Don DeLillo’s “White Noise” will also kick off the 60th New York Film Festival.

Darren Aronofsky’s “The Whale,” the Marilyn Monroe drama “Blonde,” Alejandro González Iñárritu’s “Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths” and Guadagnino’s “Bones and All,” with Timothée Chalamet, will all have their world premieres in competition at the Venice International Film Festival this fall.

Director Noah Baumbach’s adaptation of Don DeLillo’s 1985 novel “White Noise” has been selected to open the Venice International Film Festival in August, festival director Alberto Barbera said Monday.

Julianne Moore has been selected to serve as president of the main competition jury for the Venice International Film Festival this year, festival director Alberto Barbera announced Friday.

The great French film star Catherine Deneuve will receive the Golden Lion for lifetime achievement at the 79th Venice International Film Festival in September.

Hope for the future of cinema was front of mind for many as the Venice International Film Festival kicked off Wednesday on the Lido.

The Venice International Film Festival will kick off its 78th edition in September with the premiere of Pedro Almodóvar’s film “Madres Paralelas.”.

The Venice Film Festival is awarding its lifetime achievement award this year to Jamie Lee Curtis.

The Venice Film Festival is giving its lifetime achievement award this year to Oscar-winning director and actor Roberto Benigni.

The Parasite director has been selected as jury president of the 78th Venice International Film Festival, organizers said Friday. The Oscar-winner will preside over seven jurors to hand out the festivals top awards, including the prestigious Golden Lion. (Photo by Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP, File)“Parasite” director Bong Joon Ho has been selected as jury president of the 78th Venice International Film Festival, organizers said Friday. The Oscar-winner will preside over seven jurors to hand out the festival’s top awards, including the prestigious Golden Lion. As president of the jury — and more importantly as a perpetual cinephile — I’m ready to admire and applaud all the great films selected by the festival.

Pope Francis, right, greets bishops at the end of his weekly general audience in the Paul VI hall at the Vatican, Wednesday, Oct. 21, 2020. Pope Francis endorsed same-sex civil unions for the first time as pope while being interviewed for the feature-length documentary Francesco, which premiered Wednesday at the Rome Film Festival. A source in Mexico said the Vatican, which used its own cameras to shoot the interview and provided raw footage to Televisa afterward, had deleted the civil union quote in question. After the anecdote ends, the film cuts to Francis’ civil union comments in the Televisa interview. As pope, Francis had never come out publicly in favor of legal protections for civil unions, and no pontiff before him had, either.

(Photo by Joel C Ryan/Invision/AP)VENICE – The Venice Film Festival is wrapping up the first COVID-era international cinema showcase Saturday, with critics, filmmakers and actors alike cheering organizers for having dared to hold the festival amid a pandemic and demonstrating how to go to the movies again, safely. Once the virus spread, the Cannes Film Festival was canceled outright, and other big international festivals in Toronto and New York opted to go mostly online. “We were a little bit worried at the beginning, of course,” festival director Alberto Barbera said. Twenty-twenty is not the year for those kind of discussions.”Instead, she said, Venice was a film festival that focused on the integrity of the films. The diversity of countries represented is a development that festival director Barbera has greeted with particular satisfaction.

Actress Tilda Swinton holds a carnival mask as she poses for photographers upon arrival at the opening ceremony of the 77th edition of the Venice Film Festival in Venice, Italy, Wednesday, Sept. 2, 2020. Welcome to the Venice Film Festival in the time of coronavirus. We know the festival of Venice will be a sort of test for everybody, said festival director Alberto Barbera. But for veteran Venice festival-goers, the new restrictions created unprecedented hurdles that threatened to shut them out. Carlo Lazzarini has worked at the Venice film festival for 22 years, this year as chief inspector for one of the smaller screening venues.

FILE - In this Friday, Aug. 31, 2018 file photo, actress Cate Blanchett poses for photographers upon arrival at the premiere of the film 'A Star Is Born' at the 75th edition of the Venice Film Festival in Venice, Italy. The lineup for the Venice Film Festival will be announced on Tuesday, July 28, 2020, and will be the first major film event since the coronavirus pandemic lockdown. Barbera noted that almost half of the competition film selections this year are directed by women. The decision to hold the 77th edition of the Venice Film Festival is experienced like a sign of confidence in dnd concrete support of the world of film and the audiovisual industry, Barbera said. Cannes and Telluride were cancelled and others like Venice and the Toronto International Film Festival have had to get creative and scale back where possible in order to proceed.