Pedro Almodovar’s Madres Paralelas (Parallel Mothers), starring the Spanish filmmaker’s muses Penelope Cruz and Rossy De Palma, will open the 78th Venice Film Festival in September, organisers said.
The film — which follows two single women in different stages of life preparing to give birth in a maternity ward — will compete for the prestigious competition’s top prize, the Golden Lion. “I was really born as a director in Venice in 1983… 38 years later, I am called to open the festival. I am truly grateful to the festival for this recognition and hope to live up to it,” said the Oscar-winning Almodovar in a statement.
The director of the festival, Alberto Barbera, called Almodovar’s film an “intense and sensitive portrait of two women facing pregnancy with unpredictable implications, of female solidarity, of a sexuality lived in full freedom and without hypocrisy.” The festival will be held this year from September 1 to 11.
