Venice Film Festival 2026: Read All Of Deadline’s Reviews — SkimNews
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- The 83rd Venice Film Festival opened Wednesday, September 2, 2026, with Danny Boyle's "Ink" — starring Jack O'Connell, Guy Pearce and Claire Foy — depicting Rupert Murdoch's launch of tabloid journalism in 1969 London, and Deadline's reviewer calls it "thrilling stuff" with "all the cylinders firing."
- The competition lineup is notably short on studio titles and loaded with auteur fare, including Florian Zeller's "Bunker" (Penélope Cruz, Javier Bardem), Martin McDonagh's "Wild Horse Nine," Casey Affleck's "Company," Werner Herzog's "Bucking Fastard" (featuring Kate and Rooney Mara in their first movie together), Lee Chang-dong's "Possible Love" and Lance Oppenheim's "Primetime."
- Martin McDonagh is now "5-for-5 as a writer-director" per Deadline's review of "Wild Horse Nine," which also delivers what the outlet calls a "career performance" from John Malkovich and is labeled "easily one of the year's best films" and "the most spiritual."
- "Bunker" starring real-life spouses Penélope Cruz and Javier Bardem earned a 16-minute Venice ovation — the longest of the festival so far, per Deadline's separate reporting — underscoring strong reception for Zeller's blurring of reality and fiction.
- Robert Pattinson is described in Deadline's "Primetime" review as potentially "entering the Christian Bale period of his career," with the film framed as a subtle parable on how "populism fuels moral decadence."
- Werner Herzog's "Bucking Fastard" strikes "something quite sweet and generous" — "a tone Herzog has never really struck before in his fiction work," per Deadline — marking the Mara sisters' first feature together alongside Orlando Bloom and Domhnall Gleeson.
- The festival's out-of-competition slate includes Alex Gibney's "Musk" documentary about Elon Musk (called "possibly his most important"), an Oasis reunion tour documentary directed by Dylan Southern and Will Lovelace, and Laura Poitras' short about ICE protests in Minnesota.
Why it matters: With studio titles largely absent, Venice 2026 puts auteur films at the center of the early awards-season conversation: McDonagh extends his unbeaten 5-for-5 writer-director streak, and Zeller's "Bunker" earns the festival's longest ovation so far at 16 minutes — both positioning significant contenders before the season accelerates.
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