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Venice Chief Alberto Barbera on Exploring Both Sides of Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Why Film

This year’s Venice Film Festival will, for 10 days, be the starriest place on earth, with Joaquin Phoenix and Lady Gaga in “Joker: Folie à Deux,” Cate Blanchett in Alfonso Cuarón’s TV series “Disclaimer” and Daniel Craig in Luca Guadagnino’s “Queer” all lighting up the Lido. But Alberto Barbera, the festival’s artistic director, promises that Venice still has grit underlying the glamour. 

Barbera’s mandate at Venice has been extended through 2026 by new Biennale president Pietrangelo Buttafuoco, a right-wing journalist and author appointed by Italy’s ruling coalition. But Barbera makes it clear he has been given free rein at a time when top festivals are becoming “important tools” in discussions about the most persistent problems facing the world. The 81st edition features movies that delve into two major geopolitical crises. “We’ve never backed down from dealing with thorny issues that can cause controversy,” Barbera says. “This year, we’ve got documentaries about both sides of the Russia-Ukraine conflict” — “Russians at War” from exiled Russian director Anastasia Trofimova and “Songs of Slow Burning Earth” from Ukrainian filmmaker Olha Zhurba. “And there are Israeli and Palestinian films that reflect on the contradictions of this conflict.”

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Barbera spoke to Variety about the politics of Venice 2024, the challenges of facing Italian political history in a festival selection about Benito Mussolini and the resurgence of eroticism in this year’s lineup — a whole different kind of gritty filmmaking. 

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Are you worried about the drop in global box office? 

The drop is a consequence of the pandemic and the post-pandemic period. Audiences for years were forced to stay at home without being able to go to movie theaters. This generated an earthquake on the production side, causing cancellation of films, delays in production, as well as slowdowns in releases. So the moviegoing habit needs to be rebuilt. And this requires investments, creativity, etc. It will take some time. 

The film industry is, in some respects, a slow, not always reactive, industry. Especially the part of the industry associated with major studios that, as we all know, are in relatively dire economic straits and undergoing mergers, sales, acquisitions and corporate restructuring, with all that this entails. But we can definitely talk about the prospect of it starting to pick up again, perhaps next year, when film production will be back to normal at pre-pandemic levels, with a regularity of releases and new, strategic content. We know that audiences can be won over. 

Why are there so many long movies at Venice this year?

I believe that one of the somewhat significant transformations the industry is going through concerns the duration of films. Movies used to have this standard running time of between 90 and 120 minutes, right? But now those movies are the exceptions to a norm. Or, rather, to two norms, because cinema seems to be taking two opposing paths. 

On the one hand, increasingly shorter films that last just a few minutes, dropped directly onto platforms like TikTok and YouTube, consumed by millions of viewers, maybe on their way to work, on the subway, on the bus, the train. This a much more striking phenomenon in China, which, from this point of view, is way ahead of us. 

And on the other hand, longer running times are due to several factors. One is the impact of TV series. The other is an attempt by the theatrical sector to counteract the competition of streamers by offering viewers more complex, richer, longer experiences at the movie theater. 

You’ve pointed out that erotic cinema is back in Venice “in all its forms.” What’s the most erotic work playing at the festival?

The most erotic work at Venice — I don’t want to give away too much — is the Alfonso Cuarón-directed TV series “Disclaimer,” starring Cate Blanchett. The fourth episode of the series is really very extreme. 

How do you think the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is going to play out at Venice?

There is obviously no Palestinian film on the war in Gaza. But there is a sort of instant movie by Dani Rosenberg, who made “Of Dogs and Men,” shot in the immediate aftermath of the Oct. 7 terrorist attack by Hamas. It’s the story of this little girl who returns to her kibbutz in search of her dog and her mother, who was probably kidnapped by Hamas. The kibbutz is a short distance from the border with Gaza, and the film allows us to equate the horrors of Hamas terrorism with the horror of the consequences of the bombings by Israelis that take place nearby. It’s a film that, in this difficult, problematic context, manages to maintain a painful but lucid and somehow objective gaze. 

Then there is a Palestinian film, “Happy Holidays” by Scandar Copti, that is about another type of conflict — the conflict between two cultures that are not capable of coming to terms with each other and cutting each other some slack when it comes to the weight of the tradition of social conventions. So it’s the story of a Palestinian family that lives in Israel, whose son has impregnated an Israeli girl. He would like to marry her but clashes with opposition from both families. 

Do you think the series “M. Son of the Century,” which chronicles Benito Mussolini’s rise to power, can help Italy contend with its dark fascist past?

Absolutely. The series is directed by Joe Wright — whose film about Churchill, “Darkest Hour,” we all remember — and who has a foreigner’s gaze on Italy. This is an advantage, in that it takes it a somewhat more objective look at what happened during those years. 

I have always had an interest in history and thought I knew most of the events of postwar Italy, but I discovered things that I either ignored or had completely forgotten. So this series is an opportunity for an in-depth analysis that transcends any controversies that could arise. They have no reason to exist, because it is a highly documented work of historical reconstruction that concerns all of us, not just Italians. And, I must add, the time it describes has some pretty striking similarities with the present day. 

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