After ten days of screening, on the evening of September 7, local time, the Venice Film Festival held an award ceremony, and the Watertown Film Festival officially came to an end. American director Todd Phillips's "Joker" won the lion award with the highest gold prize, which can be described as the expectation of the public. This award, which is a breakthrough in the history of film and film festivals, shows the bold and sharp vision of the international jury headed by Luquesia Martel.
Prior to this, although the praise of "Joker" was continuous, the popularity was maintained from the beginning of the film festival to the end, and few people dared to bet on this film to win the Best Picture Award, more in the hope that the new clown Joaquin Phoenix could win the Best Actor Award. However, in the end, it was Luca Marinelli, the actor of the Italian film "Martin Eden", who broke through the siege and won the best actor award with exceptionally high gold content this year.
At this year's Venice Film Festival, the most competitive award is the Best Actor Award. There are very few big female protagonists in the main competition, and the awards are nothing more than Gong Li of "Lyceum Theatre", Elieza Scanlon of "Baby Teeth" and Ariane Ascared of "Victory in the World". Other comprehensive awards are all about luck, after all, no one can understand the taste of the niche international jury. Therefore, it is worth speculating on the prediction before the award, and only the best actor award is left. But this year's best actor seed contestants, top to top strong.
Brad Pitt in "Interstellar Exploration" plays an astronaut whose heart rate has never been on the eighties, going deep into space, as far as Neptune, in pursuit of his father who is bent on exploring an alien intelligent civilization. Brad Pitt, a lifelong Hollywood superstar, rarely receives award recognition, but he contributed the most restrained and delicate performance of his career in this film, coupled with director James Gray's slow and poetic audiovisual language bonus, film critics generally believe that Brad Pitt in this space epic has the closest moment to the acting award in his career.
Brad Pitt in Star Quest.
Adam Dreifer of Marriage Story once again works with New York talent Noah Baumbach. The latter is good at nagging literary romance films, and is the type that is easiest to produce performance awards. Not to mention the confrontation between Adam Dreifer and the famous actress Scarlett Johansson - she is an open-ended actress who does not show her face and can win awards by dubbing alone, and the divorced couple played by the two people has contributed one spark after another. In the last two scenes of the film, Adam Dreifer sings the golden song "Being Alive" from the famous musical "Company" and recites a letter written to him by his wife, which makes the Venetian audience cry for love.
Stills from Marriage Story.
In addition, Jean Dujardin in "I Accuse" has already won the best actor from Cannes to the Oscars with "The Artist". David Huris in "Guest of Honor" won the Best Actor in Cannes at a young age and has long been the first echelon of British drama bones. But none of the above geniuses can compare to Jacqueline Phoenix of "Joker". The genius who has always "acted with his life", became famous as a teenager, was nominated for an Oscar at the age of 26 for his performance in "Gladiator", and just won the best actor in Cannes in 2017 with his exquisite performance in "You Were Never Here", and everyone is looking forward to his second Venice Best Actor after "The Master" in 2013. What's more, he was challenged to play the Joker after Heath Ledger this time.
Joker.
Joaquin Phoenix began preparing six months before the film began, slimming down, discussing character personalities with the director, polishing every joke of the clown, reading various related books, and practicing the clown's pathological laughter. Director Todd Phillips said at a news conference that the role of the Joker was co-created by him and Joaquin Phoenix, and that the two men had made extraordinary efforts to do so. So there is the clown that the audience sees on the big screen, nervous, melancholy, sensitive, vulnerable, and with the innocent desire to bring people smiles and happiness. In the final moment when the ordinary Arthur transforms into a clown, everyone is overwhelmed by Jacqueline Phoenix's crushing acting skills.
Luca Malnelli said at a news conference that he still can't believe he won the best actor award, which feels ridiculous and a mistake. Joaquin Phoenix's performance was so dazzling that even his opponents were impressed. But in the end, the jury chose to give Joker a further award, giving the best picture award to the film. One of the international judges, Italian director Paolo Velzi, said the festival has an unwritten rule that if a film has already won the Golden Lion, it cannot win other individual awards at the same time. It also suggests that they had considered awarding best actor to Joker's actor, Jacqueline Phoenix. Verzi went on to say that he also loved Luca Marinelli's character very much, and as a friend, a peer, a judge, he liked Luca very much. Everyone in the jury was touched by his performance in Martin Eden.
So who is this Luca Manelli? Born in 1984, he is very young and has a considerable reputation in Italy, and has twice been nominated for the Italian David Award for Best Actor. This time, "Martin Eden" is undoubtedly his big male protagonist. Director Pietro Marcello moved the classic original story from the United States to Italy with a perfect script that was tightly stitched together, so that the arrogance and prejudice faced by the male protagonist Martin Eden are more European. The disillusionment of an American dream is interpreted as a story of personal fate in the ups and downs of European society.
In the digital image of retro film texture, in the director's carefully polished classical reality, Martin Eden's life presents a sense of fatalistic tragedy. Luca Malnelli's handsome and rugged appearance is perfect for playing Martin Eden, a sailor, who presents a tragic life of a young man from growth and transformation to self-worth and self-destruction with superb acting skills. This best actor, get it really.
□ Gu Caocao (Film Critic)
Beijing News Editor Wu Longzhen Proofreader Li Shihui