The Venice Film Festival has taken the unusual step of canceling this year’s main jury press conference, we can reveal.
The festival, which starts next week, has not issued a public statement to confirm the break from protocol but has confirmed the move to us after multiple requests to see if it will continue.
The move comes at a time of highly charged press conferences at high-profile festivals, with journalists frequently quizzing jurors and talent about world politics, especially the war between Israel and Gaza.
The festival denied that the move had been taken with these considerations in mind, saying instead that it was the result of a “scheduling conflict”.
The international jury for this year’s Venice Film Festival is chaired by Maggie Gyllenhaal, and its members include Tunisian director and screenwriter Kawthar Ben Hania, English composer and artist Daniel Bloomberg, Italian professor Francesco Cassetti, French director and screenwriter Xavier Giannulli, Afghan director and screenwriter Shahrbano Sadat, and Hong Kong director and producer Johnny To.
Ben Hania was present at the festival last year with a famous drama Hind Rajab’s voiceAbout the tragic killing of the five-year-old Palestinian girl Hind Rajab.
At the jury’s press conference in Venice last year, jury foreman Alexander Payne admitted he was “unprepared” to answer questions about Gaza given the dominance of political issues.
This year’s Berlinale was a highly charged edition, with the jury’s opening press conference proving to be a flashpoint after jury president Wim Wenders said filmmakers should stay out of politics in response to a question about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The festival had to publicly defend its jury members and call for a different approach in the press conferences that followed when questions about politics dominated. The topic of censorship by the press was brought up at the jury press conference at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, and dominated the columns at the event.
The festival will be held from September 2 to 12, 2026
