Biennale Cinema
History of the Venice Film Festival
The Nineties
Of the films and filmmakers launched during Pontecorvo's period, mention must be made of the young Italians Mario Martone (Morte di un matematico napoletano), Aurelio Grimaldi (La discesa di Aclą a Floristella), Carlo Carlei (La corsa dell'innocente at the first Festival, along with Sally Potter (Orlando) and Neil Jordan (The Crying Game). Over the following years the Lido witnessed a series of appearances by filmmakers and works including Altman (Short Cuts, Golden Lion) and Abel Ferrara, de Heer and Radford (Il postino), Peter Jackson (Heavenly Creatures) and Milcho Manchevski (Before the Rain, Golden Lion), Lee Tamahori and Kathryn Bigelow (Strange Days), Tsai Ming Liang and Anh Hung Tran (two oriental Golden Lions), Gregg Araki, then Jane Campion once more (The Portrait of a Lady).
One of the innovations introduced by Pontecorvo was the landmark section "Finestra sulle immagini", a lively workshop of film and video, shorts, medium length and feature films, animation, anything new and unusual on offer from audio-visual production.
Under the direction of Felice Laudadio the films of Takeshi Kitano were launched on the international stage; in 1997 he received the Golden Lion for Hana-bi. In 1998 Cosģ ridevano by Gianni Amelio became the ninth Golden Lion awarded to an Italian film. At this time a vast marquee was also erected in Via Sandro Gallo to host the ever-increasing members of the public for the Festival screenings.
In 1999, Alberto Barbera was appointed as director of the festival. He took up the position until 2001.
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