The 83rd Venice International Film Festival opened on Wednesday with Danny Boyle’s Ink, a drama about Rupert Murdoch’s 1969 takeover of The Sun. George Clooney was also due to receive a lifetime-achievement Golden Lion as an 11-day programme of prestige premieres and political documentaries began on the Lido.
Written by James Graham and adapted from his stage play, Ink stars Guy Pearce as Murdoch, Jack O’Connell as Sun editor Larry Lamb and Claire Foy. Its world premiere follows the opening ceremony at the Palazzo del Cinema.
Festival director Alberto Barbera said many of this year’s submissions confronted contemporary crises. The programme includes Naza, a documentary about Gaza, Alex Gibney’s four-hour Musk and My Undesirable Friends: Part II – Exile, which follows independent Russian journalists reporting from abroad.
Competition jury president Maggie Gyllenhaal used the opening day to argue that cinema is «fundamentally, unavoidably political.»
She also blamed systemic barriers for the low number of female filmmakers in the main programme, saying women often struggled to finance stories that the industry did not consider important.
Read more: The must-see pavilions at the 2026 Venice Biennale.
Venice premieres to watch
Martin McDonagh’s Wild Horse Nine, screening from 3 September, brings together Sam Rockwell, John Malkovich, Steve Buscemi, Parker Posey and Tom Waits in a CIA comedy-thriller. Other major competition titles include Florian Zeller’s Bunker, starring Penélope Cruz and Javier Bardem, and Werner Herzog’s Bucking Fastard, which casts sisters Kate and Rooney Mara together.
Robert Pattinson leads Lance Oppenheim’s Primetime, a drama examining the ethically murky world of televised predator investigations. Lee Chang-dong returns with the relationship drama Possible Love, while Hirokazu Kore-eda enters the Golden Lion race with Look Back.
Read more: Robert Pattinson transforms into a controversial TV host in Primetime.
Outside the competition, Oasis: Don’t Look Back in Anger follows Liam and Noel Gallagher’s reunion tour. Gibney’s Elon Musk documentary and Luca Guadagnino’s seven-hour tribute to Bernardo Bertolucci provide the non-fiction programme with some of its biggest talking points.
The festival runs until 12 September, when Gyllenhaal’s jury will award the Golden Lion. Ellen Burstyn is also scheduled to receive a lifetime-achievement honour later in the festival.
