The Venice Film Festival kicks off this week, rolling out the red carpet for Julia Roberts and George Clooney in a series of world premieres at the glamorous event on the sands of the Lido, AFP reported.

A whole host of big names in cinema will arrive by water taxis at the Venetian seaside resort for the festival, which begins on Wednesday — from Jude Law to Emma Stone — attracting hundreds of fans hoping to catch a glimpse of their favorite stars.

Among the renowned directors in the program of the 82nd edition are Werner Herzog, Jim Jarmusch, Kathryn Bigelow, Gus Van Sant, and Park Chan-wook, who returns to the festival after 20 years.

Venice, one of the most important stages on the international film calendar, showcases both major productions with commercial potential — such as Benny Safdie’s The Smashing Machine, starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson as an aging fighter — as well as smaller independent titles.

Despite the glamorous setting, some of the included films, focused on pressing issues, are likely to spark debate. As the war in Ukraine continues, Jude Law will portray Russian President Vladimir Putin in Olivier Assayas’s biographical film The Wizard of the Kremlin. Director Kaouther Ben Hania presents The Voice of Hind Rajab — a film shot in Gaza that tells the true story of a six-year-old Palestinian girl killed in January 2024 by Israeli forces along with six members of her family as they tried to leave Gaza City; the film uses an actual audio recording of Hind’s plea for help.

Hollywood megastar Julia Roberts will make her Venetian debut on Friday with Luca Guadagnino’s After the Hunt, centered on a case of sexual assault at a prestigious American university; the film screens out of competition. After delighting fans on the red carpet last year, George Clooney returns with his role in Noah Baumbach’s Netflix production Jay Kelly, in which he plays a beloved actor undergoing an identity crisis; Adam Sandler has a supporting role as his manager.

Several Venice winners, such as Nomadland and Joker, later triumphed at the Oscars, making the Italian festival a crucial platform for launching cinematic success. Streaming platforms like Netflix and Amazon are also increasingly choosing the festival for their world premieres.

Two-time Oscar winner and director of Sideways Alexander Payne chairs the jury this year and will award the Golden Lion for Best Film to one of the 21 contenders in the main competition on September 6.

Competing for the top prize are new works by directors such as Assayas, Guillermo del Toro, Yorgos Lanthimos, and Kathryn Bigelow. Wednesday’s opening night will feature a love story by regular participant Paolo Sorrentino. Sorrentino, acclaimed for La Grande Bellezza, once again collaborates with his longtime partner Toni Servillo in La Grazia, set in Italy.

Greek filmmaker Lanthimos and Emma Stone — the duo behind the Oscar-winning Poor Things — reunite for the sci-fi Bugonia, in which a high-ranking executive is kidnapped by people who believe she is an alien. Mexican director del Toro presents Frankenstein — a grand interpretation of the classic starring Oscar Isaac. Bigelow’s latest work (Zero Dark Thirty, The Hurt Locker) is the political thriller A House of Dynamite with Idris Elba; both films will stream on Netflix.

American director Jim Jarmusch enters Venice’s main program for the first time with Father, Mother, Sister, Brother, which he describes as a “funny and sad film,” starring Cate Blanchett, Adam Driver, and Tom Waits. Among the documentaries in the main program is the new work by Italian filmmaker Gianfranco Rosi, Sotto le Nuvole (Under the Clouds), a black-and-white ode to Naples.

Out of competition, audiences will see documentaries such as Sofia Coppola’s profile of fashion designer Marc Jacobs; new work from Golden Lion winner Laura Poitras about veteran American investigative journalist Seymour Hersh; and a portrait of British singer Marianne Faithfull by the creative duo Jane Pollard and Iain Forsyth. | BGNES