Venice Film Festival 2022: Awards – Abus de Ciné

It’s hard not to have a feeling of disappointment with the prize list of a Venice Film Festival 2022 in the high-level competition, which will have finally won the only documentary in competition, “All the beauty and the bloodshed“, an in-depth portrait of photographer and activist Nan Goldin, dealing in particular with her fight against opiate manufacturers. A film which will however undoubtedly remain minor, in the face of the immense “bardo” by Alejandro G. Inarritu, “The Whale“by Darren Aronofsky and especially”love-life” by Kôji Fukada, the real big forgotten of the charts, which unlike the two other films mentioned here had unanimous approval here.

The greatest surprises come from the very high price for a “Saint-Omer“Widely overestimated (the Grand Prix), a daunting succession of fixed shots and recitations, which leads to a banal conclusion on the transmission (all that for that), and the price of the staging for Luca Guadagnino (whose we adored other much more successful films… including his latest documentary, still unseen in France) for a “Bones and all“which deals with the acceptance of his difference, but for which he did not fail to serve up the hackneyed speech of the palme d’or”Titanium” last year, on the rights of supposed “monsters”. His young actress Taylor Russel meanwhile earned her breakthrough award, because she carries much of this coming-of-age film on her shoulders. But what about the prize for best first film for “Saint-Omer“, while Alice Diop has already made several feature films, including the laborious documentary-essay “We” presented in Berlin in 2021. A real scandal that deprived other directors of a prize for their real first work. Documentaries are a genre in themselves, they are no less feature filmsn, like the moreover proves the message sent by the winner as the Golden Lion.

Luckily Jafar Panahi got a nice standing ovation for his jury prize with “No bears” (“Bears don’t exist“), at different levels of reading. The prize for the best screenplay went quite rightly to Martin McDonagh for the formidable “The Banshees of Inisherin“, while the role of distraught friend of Colin Farrell in the same film will have earned him a surprise, but deserved actor award. Finally Cate Blanchett will have succeeded in convincing the jury with his formidable performance in “Thasr“, as a conductor of recurring abuses of power. She fully deserves it, but the fact that she has already had the prize for “I’m not there” by Todd Haynes 15 years ago was not working in his favor, given the competition.

On the Orizzonti section side, it is the hard-hitting Iranian film “World War III“who brought back the Best Picture Award with his story of homelessness led to replacing the actor playing Hitler in a film shot on the ground where he resides, its main actor, Mohsen Tanabandeh, also leaving with the Interpretation Prize. Finally , the very intelligent “From the main square“, on the rise of totalitarianism, won the Grand Prize in the Immersive Venice section (virtual reality films), the Golden Lion going to “The man who couldn’t leave“, one of the 5 films in VR out of 30 that we unfortunately could not discover, due to lack of time. We will come back to all the parallel sections and the collateral prizes in the coming days. August 30 next year to celebrate the 80th anniversary of the Mostra Del cinema.

The winners of the official Venice Film Festival 2022 competition

Golden Lion
ALL THE BEAUTY AND THE BLOODSHED
by Laura Poitras

Grand Jury Prize
SAINT-OMER
by Alice Diop

Staging Award
Luca Guadagnino
for BONES AND ALL

Volpi Cup for Best Actress
Cate Blanchett
in TAR by Todd Field

Volpi Cup for Best Actor
Colin Farrel
in THE BANSHEES OF INISHERIN by Martin McDonagh

Best Screenplay Award
Martin McDonagh
for THE BANSHEES OF INISHERIN

Special Jury Prize
KHERS NIST (NO BEARS)
by Jafar Panahi

Marcello Mastroianni Revelation Award
Taylor Russell
in BONES AND ALL by Luca Guadagnino (USA, Italy)

Lion of the future for a first film
SAINT-OMER
by Alice Diop

Prize list of the Orizzonti and Orizzonti Extra section

Orizzonti Award for Best Film
WORLD WAR III
(Jang-e Jahani Sevom)
by Houman Seyedi

Orizzonti Award for Best Director
Tizza Covi and Rainer Frimmel
for VERA

Special Jury Prize Orizzonti
BREAD AND SALT
(CHLEB I SÓL)
by Damian Kocur

Orizzonti Award for Best Actress
Vera Gemma
in VERA by Tizza Covi and Rainer Frimmel

Orizzonti Award for Best Actor
Mohsen Tanabandeh
in WORLD WAR III (JANG-E JAHANI SEVOM) by Houman Seyedi

Orizzonti Prize for Best Screenplay
Fernando Guzzoni
for BLANQUITA by Fernando Guzzoni

Orizzonti Short Film Prize
SNOW IN SEPTEMBER by Lkhagvadulam Purev-Ochir

Audience Award Orizzonti Extra (first film)
NEZOUH
by Soudade Kaadan

Winners of the Venice Classics section

Award for Best Documentary Film
FRAGMENTS OF PARADISE
by KD Davison

Best catering award
BRANDED TO KILL (Koroshi no Rakuin)
by Suzuki Seijun

Winners of the Venice Immersive section

Prize for the best VR experience
THE MAN WHO COULDN’T LEAVE
by Singing Chen

Grand Jury Prize
FROM THE MAIN SQUARE
by Pedro Hares

Special Jury Prize
EGGSCAPE
by German Heller