Five Italian films in competition at Venice Film Festival

(ANSA) - ROME, JUL 23 - Five Italian films will be in the running for the Golden Lion at the 81st Venice Film Festival, which takes place from August 28 to September 7 and will be packed with Hollywood stars, organizers said on Tuesday.
    The Italian movies in competition are Gianni Amelio's Battlefield; Maura Delpero's Vermiglio; Iddu by Fabio Grassadonia and Antonio Piazza with Toni Servillo and Elio Germano; Luca Guadagnino's Queer starring Daniel Craig; and Giulia Steigerwalt's Diva Futura.
    The festival will open with the premier of Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, the long awaited sequel to Tim Burton's cult 1988 fantasy horror comedy.
    The follow-up, again directed by Burton and starring Michael Keaton, Winona Ryder, Catherine O'Hara, Justin Theroux, and Monica Bellucci, and with Jenna Ortega and Willem Dafoe, is Out of Competition at the world's oldest film fest.
    Tilda Swinton, Julianne Moore and John Turturro are also coming to the festival to present Pedro Almodóvar's The Room Next Door.
    Brad Pitt and George Clooney pair up in Jon Watts' Wolfs and Adrien Brody, Guy Pearce and Felicity Jones feature in Brady Corbet's The Brutalist.
    Then there will be Jude Law for Justin Kurzel's The Order and Angelina Jolie for Pablo Larrain's Maria, which also stars Italy's Pierfrancesco Favino and Alba Rohrwacher.
    Joaquin Phoenix and Lady Gaga are the stars of another hotly awaited sequel Joker: Folie a Deux by Todd Phillips.
    Antonio Banderas and Nicole Kidman will also be in Venice for Halina Reijn's Babygirl.
    Photo: Giulia Steigerwalt. (ANSA).