The opening night film is Danny Boyle's Ink, an adaptation of the acclaimed stage play about the early years of Rupert Murdoch - played by Guy Pearce - and his acquisition of the daily newspaper The Sun. Jack O'Connell and Claire Foy also star.
George Clooney is back to being a near-annual fixture. This time he'll be at the festival to pick up a lifetime achievement award. He's also a producer on Furies.
Other stars expected include Noel and Liam Gallagher of Oasis, Rooney and Kate Mara, Robert Pattinson, Penélope Cruz, Javier Bardem, Pamela Anderson, Sam Rockwell, John Malkovich, Louis Garrel, Cho Yeo-jeong and Ellen Burstyn, who is also getting a lifetime achievement award.
As far as awards are concerned, perhaps the most anticipated is Martin McDonagh's dark comedy Wild Horse Nine, starring Rockwell and Malkovich as a pair of CIA agents before the 1973 Chilean coup.
There is also excitement about Pattinson playing To Catch a Predator host Chris Hansen in Primetime, Cruz and Bardem co-starring in Florian Zeller's psychological drama Bunker, the Mara sisters playing twins in Werner Herzog's Bucking Fastard and Lee Chang-dong's first film in eight years, Possible Love.
In the documentary category, Alex Gibney is bringing Musk, his nearly four-hour investigation into the world's richest man, and Julia Loktev continues her sprawling portrait of independent Russian journalists in My Undesirable Friends: Part II — Exile. Oasis: Don't Look Back in Anger also follows the Gallagher brothers during their 2025 reunion tour.
Ilya Khrzhanovsky's film DAU, inspired by the lives of the Soviet physicists working on the atomic bomb, has been at the center of some heated discourse.
Ukraine's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Culture and the Embassy of Ukraine in Italy questioned its inclusion in the festival, where it's playing in competition, calling it a "project linked to the Russian state and its networks of influence."
Festival director Alberto Barbera defended its selection, writing in a statement that it "is not a Russian film. It is not pro-Putin propaganda. It is a film that denounces totalitarian regimes and their intrusion into citizens' lives to restrict their freedom."
Earlier this year, geopolitical tensions spilled over into the Venice Biennale contemporary art exhibition after the jury quit in protest over the participation of Russia and Israel.
There are two Palestinian films in the official selection: Al Mowaten Osama by Ahmed Hassouna and Hiwar ma' albahr by Muayad Alayan.
This year's competition jury is headed by US director and actress Maggie Gyllenhaal. The award winners will be announced on September 12.
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