19/07/2021 - The Spanish director who claims "It was in Venice, in 1983, that I was reborn as a director" will present his film, starring Penélope Cruz, in competition

Directed by Pedro Almodóvar, Parallel Mothers [+see also:
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“It was in Venice, in 1983, that I was reborn as a director”, enthused Pedro Almodóvar, “within the Midday Midnight line-up (Editor’s note: with Dark Habits). Thirty-eight years later I’ve been asked to open the Festival. I cannot express the joy and honour I feel, and how much this means to me, without drifting into self-congratulation. I am very grateful to the festival for their recognition, and I hope to live up to this honour”.

The festival’s director Alberto Barbera stated that he was "grateful to Pedro Almodóvar for granting us the privilege of opening the Film Festival by way of his new film, an intense and sensitive portrait of two women grappling with the issues and unforeseeable complications that come with their particular experience of motherhood, a portrait of female solidarity and of a form of sexuality which is lived in full freedom and without hypocrisy, set against a reflection on the inescapable need for truth, which should be pursued without question. It marks a most welcome return to the Venice competition for the winner of the 2019 Lifetime Achievement Golden Lion, many years on from the success of Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, which established him as an international name".

Parallel Mothers will be screened on Wednesday 1 September in the Sala Grande of the Palazzo del Cinema located on Venice’s Lido, during the Festival’s opening ceremony. Sold worldwide by US outfit FilmNation Entertainment, the movie will be distributed in Spain by Sony Pictures Entertainment Iberia (on 10 September) and in Italy by Warner Bros. Pictures.

(Translated from Italian)