Australian filmmaker Peter Weir, director of “The Truman Show” (1998) and “The Dead Poets Club” (1989), will receive an honorary Golden Lion at the 81st edition of the Venice Film Festival, which It will take place from August 28th to September 7th, the organizers of the event announced this Thursday.
“The Venice Film Festival and its Golden Lion are part of the imagination of our profession. Being rewarded for a lifetime’s work as a filmmaker is a great honor”, commented the 79-year-old honoree, quoted in the statement from the Italian film festival .
“With only 13 films directed in 40 years, Peter Weir secured a place in the firmament of the great directors of modern cinema,” said the Mostra’s artistic director, Alberto Barbera.
Peter Weir won two BAFFTA awards, the British Oscar, for directing “The Truman Show”, a scathing satire on ‘reality shows’ starring Jim Carrey, and “Master & Commander – The Far Side of the World” (2003), with Russell Crowe.
An essential figure of the Australian “new wave” cinematographic movement in the 1970s, nominated six times for the Oscars without ever winning, as a director, screenwriter and producer (he received an honorary statuette in November 2022), the list of films also includes “Picnic at Hanging Rock” (1975), “The Last Wave” (1977), “Gallipoli” (1981), “The Year of All Perils” (1982), “The Witness” (1985), “The Mosquito Coast” (1986), “Marriage for Convenience” (1990), “Without Fear of Living” (1993) and “Towards Freedom” (2010).
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