Highlights at the 82nd Venice Film Festival

After a whirlwind of screenings, premieres, red carpets, and events, we finally find ourselves back in the City of Angels after attending the 82nd Venice International Film Festival.

Everybody in Lido, Italy who attended the festival was probably shocked by the results when the Alexander Payne-led jury chose Jim Jarmusch's comedy drama anthology starring Cate Blanchett and Adam Driver, "Father Mother Sister Brother," for the Golden Lion top award while the crowd and press favorite, "The Voice of Hind Rajab," just ended up with the runner-up award or the Silver Lion.

The South Korean satirical black comedy thriller of Park Chan Wook, "No Other Choice," another Venice favorite, did not end up with anything.

At the press conference, jury president Payne divulged that "No Other Choice" unfortunately did not even make it to the magic eight (out of 21 films). He said, "We loved many films. That's the unfair thing about being at a festival, it has to say this is better than that. It's not."

Other members of the jury included Brazilian actress Fernanda Torres, Italian director Maura Delpero, Romanian director Cristian Mungiu, Iranian filmmaker Mohammad Rasoulof, and Chinese actor-producer Zhao Tao.

Making special surprise appearances everywhere during the festival was Seth Rogen so we asked Seth himself at "The Smashing Machine" after-party if he was planning to do an episode of "The Venice International Film Festival" for the multi-Emmy-nominated show "The Studio."

Seth said, "That would be nice." He confessed that it was his first-ever international film festival.

Talking about "The Smashing Machine" after-party, we talked to stars Dwayne Johnson and Emily Blunt and the two actors shared that their confrontational scene in the movie was the most challenging of all. "It was a very emotional scene for both of us," admitted Emily.

Dwayne Johnson and Emily Blunt. Photo by Janet Susan Nepales

Their director, Benny Safdie, also bagged the best director award at the festival. Other winners included Chinese actress Xin Zhilei who won Best Actress for Cai Shangjun's "The Sun Rises on Us All," Italian actor Toni Servillo won Best Actor for the festival's opening film "La Grazia", and Swiss actor Luna Wedler bagged the newcomer award, the Marcello Mastroianni Award, for "Silent Friend."

At the "Frankenstein" pre-premiere party, director Guillermo del Toro was besieged by admirers including filmmaker Julian Schnabel, who also had a film in the festival, "In the Hand of Dante." Both movies star Oscar Isaac, who portrays Victor Frankenstein in "Frankenstein" and Nick Tosches/Dante Alighieri in the film "In the Hand of Dante."

We were even surprised when director Julian himself volunteered to take our photo with his star Oscar Isaac.

At the premiere of "Frankenstein," which received a 13-minute standing ovation, 28-year-old actor Jacob Elordi, who portrayed the monster Frankenstein, broke down in tears after seeing the warm reception from the Venice audience to his movie. Upon exiting the theatre, we were also pleasantly surprised when director Guillermo kissed us on the cheek after we congratulated him.

Also moved and very emotional at the premiere of their movie "The Smashing Machine" was actor Dwayne Johnson, who uncontrollably sobbed as his movie got a 15-minute standing ovation from the crowd.

But the longest standing ovation at the festival was given to Tunisian filmmaker Kaouther Ben Hania's very powerful political film, "The Voice of Hind Rajab," which received a record-breaking 23 minute, 50-second standing ovation.

The audience also chanted "Free Palestine" after the movie, and the lights went up after the screening.

The drama tells the story of how five-year-old Hind Rajab was killed in Gaza City last January with four cousins, her aunt and uncle, and two paramedics who tried to rescue her from Israeli forces.

Another political film that was not to be missed was Kathryn Bigelow's nuclear thriller "A House of Dynamite," which received an 11-minute standing ovation.

This is her first film after an eight-year hiatus. The movie, which stars Idris Elba and Rebecca Ferguson, opens when an unidentified missile is launched at the United States. So, there is a race to determine who is responsible for the missile and how to respond.

From politics to fashion, there was also Sofia Coppola's documentary on fashion icon Marc Jacobs, "Marc by Sofia" that was also warmly received in Venice with a standing ovation.

In a press conference, the 54-year-old filmmaker said that the 97-minute film was simply a "personal portrait" of a friend. It showed the 12 weeks leading up to the Marc Jacobs Spring 2024 show with Sofia interviewing the 62-year-old designer about his reflections on his career milestones and highlights.

During the press conference, Sofia said, "It was really a sincere, small project. It was really important for me to show Marc as a creative person in his process, and I was happy that he felt comfortable around me. I think it's always important for me to show something genuine, show the person that I love and their real side." —MGP, GMA Integrated News