Somewhere wins Top Prize at Venice Film Festival

Sofia Coppola’s poetic drama Somewhere won the Golden Lion for best film at this year’s Venice Film Festival by a unanimous decision. Director Quentin Tarantino, who headed up this year’s jury, told the San Francisco Chronicle, “This was a film that enchanted us from our first screening…Yet from that first enchanting screening, it grew and grew and grew in both our hearts, in our analysis, in our minds, and in our affections.”

The film, which opens this December from Focus Features, follows the shifting moods of a mixed-up movie star (Stephen Dorff) whose prolonged stay at Los Angeles’ glamorous Chateau Marmont is profoundly shifted when his 11-year old daughter (Elle Fanning) comes to stay with him.

The Venice Film Festival remains a favorite for Focus filmmakers, as it awarded Ang Lee the Golden Lion in 2005 for Brokeback Mountain, and then again in 2007 for Lust, Caution. For a complete list of awards at Venice this year go here.