Parallel Mothers,
the new film by Pedro Almodóvar will open on September 1 at the Venice Film Festival.
The film will compete in the official section of the 78th edition of the Mostra.
The appointment will be held until September 11.
The announcement reinforces the filmmaker's recent love affair with the contest: in 2019, he won the Golden Lion of Honor and offered a master class;
and last year he premiered his medium-length film
La voz human
at the Lido
.
Although the relationship between Almodóvar and La Mostra, in reality, comes from much further away. “I was born as a director at [the festival in] Venice in 1983 in the Mezzogiorno Mezzanotte section, and 38 years later I was chosen to inaugurate it. I cannot express the joy, the honor of what this represents for me without falling into self-pity ”, explained the filmmaker, who premiered at the Italian festival with his film
Entre tinieblas,
the fourth of his filmography.
Parallel Mothers
is the twenty-fourth. Almodóvar also participated in Venice last year, with the medium-length film, based on a text by Jean Cocteau,
The Human Voice.
And in 2019, the festival sealed its love affair with the film director with the award of the Honorary Golden Lion.
Another of the great moments in the history of Almodóvar in Venice came in 1988, with the premiere of Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown.
Then he won the award for best screenplay.
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The cast of
Parallel Mothers
is made up of Penelope Cruz, the young Milena Smit, Israel Elejalde and Aitana Sánchez-Gijón, along with two classic faces in Almodóvar's filmography: Julieta Serrano and Rossy de Palma.
Last June Pedro Almodóvar announced that he was speeding up the post-production of his latest film to be able to release it in theaters in Spain on September 10.
With that decision, he said, he hoped to encourage the return of the public to theaters after the summer, and after a catastrophic year for the exhibition guild due to the pandemic.
Milena Smitt, left, and Penelope Cruz, in 'Parallel Mothers', by Pedro Almodóvar.
THE DESIRE
The director of the Mostra, the Italian Alberto Barbera, thanked the "privilege" of having to open the official section with
Parallel Mothers
, which he defined as an "intense and sensitive portrait of two women who confront the issues of a motherhood unpredictable ”.
He has also pointed out that the film deals with themes such as "female solidarity, a sexuality lived in full freedom and without hypocrisy, with a reflection on the inescapable need to find the truth at its core".
The Mostra is the oldest international competition in the world.
And one of the few that has not lost a year due to the pandemic.
Last summer its managers insisted on holding an edition full of doubts.
Cannes, for example, had to suspend its celebration in 2020.
His program is not yet known, which will be known later this month. For now, the premiere of one of the most anticipated feature films of recent years,
Dune,
remake by Denis Villeneuve
(The Arrival)
of the eighties science fiction classic
, has been confirmed
, and that the jury will be chaired by the Korean director Bong Joon-hoo, director of Parasites (2019), which won an Oscar last year. Roberto Benigni and Jamie Lee Curtis will be honored with individual Golden Lions.