‘Athena’ Review: Romain Gavras’ Police Brutality Thriller Is Positively Electrifying [Venice]

Zack Sharf Bryce Dallas Howard revealed in a new interview with Metro that she was asked to lose weight before filming “Jurassic World Dominion,” which marked her third outing in the “Jurassic World” franchise. Howard said her weight has often been a topic of discussion among studio executives, and that conversation came up again before shooting “Dominion.” The actor credits director Colin Trevorrow with rejecting such demands. “What being in this third film allowed, how do I say this, how do I say this, how do I say this…[I’ve] been asked to not use my natural body in cinema,” Howard said. “On the third movie, it was actually because there were so many women cast, it was something that Colin felt very strongly about in terms of protecting me…because the conversation came up again, ‘We need to ask Bryce to lose weight.'”

Anna Tingley If you purchase an independently reviewed product or service through a link on our website, Variety may receive an affiliate commission. The Emmy-winning Netflix series “Squid Game” is set be the most popular TV-inspired Halloween for the second year in a row. According to data collected by CasinoTop10, Squid Game costumes outnumbered Google searches for any other film and TV character costumes, beating out other popular costume inspo such as Harley Quinn, Cruella, Spiderman, the Joker and more. In the ultra-popular series, hundreds of debt-ridden people sign up to compete in order to win a life-changing cash prize.

Libra. A Cardinal air sign, Libra is symbolized by the scales and balances, the only sign in the big top of the zodiac wheel represented by an inanimate object. As such, Libra is associated with equanimity and justice, unicycles, the rule of order, tree poses, the golden ratio and divine law.

Lorraine simply added: "Beyond brave."However, Twitter user Limond_charles appeared to disagree with Lorraine's show of support as he branded the broadcaster an "airhead".He typed: "Lorraine your such an Air Head!!" (sic)Lorraine soon after hit back, taking aim at the remark by correcting him on his grammar error, as she responded: "It’s you’re."Other Twitter users were quick to reply to the tweet in defence of the ITV host.Pwarman27 penned: “Legendary response….beautifully done.”Susansimmons13 chimed in: “Some rude people around their parents must be proud.”Lorraine's rection comes after the TV star paid tribute to ITV guest Sally Nyland after it emerged she had died.Sally died of breast cancer after she'd joined the show's campaign to raise awareness of the disease.Three years ago Sally appeared on Lorraine as she joined the campaign to raise awareness with the ‘Change and Check’ campaign.After Lorraine returned from an advert break, the ITV presenter told viewers: “Welcome back.

Kate, the Prince and Princess of Wales, were relieved when Meghan and Harry left the UK. According to the Sun, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex have returned to the US leaving William and Kate with “a sense of relief” because "the drama was gone".

MotoGP teams of Suzuki and Aprilia.Fortunately, no injuries were reported with the Marc VDS team tweeting: “Fortunately all the team members are well and safe despite the fire in our garage. Thanks a lot to everybody who is caring and especially to those on site helping to control the situation.”READ MORE: F1 meets MotoGP as Carlos Sainz helps Marc Marquez adapt to Madrid life after injury woeIt remains to be seen if the drama will affect the team’s running this weekend, with pictures posted on social media showing a badly damaged garage covered in ash after the fire had been extinguished.

READ MORE: Passengers rage after man lights up cigarette on delayed flight causing chaos It was widely circulated on Twitter with over 63,000 likes and 23,000 retweets.Jennie wrote: “SHOCKED AND DISGUSTED WITH ALBASTAR AIRLINES - told me I should wear a nappy on board as I’m disabled and they don’t have an aisle chair.“This is what I had to resort to. Please share – this isn’t acceptable!!!”In the clip, Jennie sat on the floor of the plane and used her arms to pull herself down the aisle from her seat to the loo.She commented: “Hi everyone, I’m Jennie, I’m a wheelchair user and I’m paralysed from the waist down.

West Ham United legend Mark Noble is set to embark on his first challenge since hanging up his boots at the end of last season, taking on a role as sporting director at the London Stadium.Regarded as one of the greatest players to have never played for England, the ex-Hammers captain will return to his boyhood club in a new capacity after the turn of the year.

Premier League's highest paid player once refused to pay his milkman £4.50, telling him: "It's an honour I drink from your dairy."That's according to one of Fabrizio Ravanelli's former Middlesbrough teammates, who said the eccentric Italian "just thought he shouldn’t be paying for stuff like that" because of who he was. Ravanelli made the previously untrodden journey from European giants Juventus to Teesside in the summer of 1996 after Bryan Robson agreed to pay £7.5m for the striker's services. READ MORE: Ex-England star can ‘make his willy disappear’ and showed ‘trick’ to Steven GerrardBankrolled by fiercely ambitious and extremely wealthy local businessman Steve Gibson, the club paid him a reported £42,000-a-week, making him the league's biggest earner.

Chrishell Stause can't stop gushing about her partner, G Flip. The 41-year-old star took to Instagram on Wednesday to celebrate the 28th birthday of the Australian musician. «It is already Sept 22nd right now in Australia so HAPPY BIRTHDAY G!!!!» Stause captioned a slideshow of photos of herself and G Flip.

Jo Koy and his ex-girlfriend, Chelsea Handler. On Wednesday's episode of, the 51-year-old comedian shared that it's been easy to maintain a friendship with his ex. “It’s not that hard,” Koy said.  Koy and Handler split just ahead of their one-year anniversary, and he told Clarkson that it’s important for him to set a great example for his 19-year-old son, Joseph Jr.   “It’s just, especially when you have a kid — I have a son -- and when you go through a breakup you want to be a role model as well,” he explained.

Naman Ramachandran The Unifrance cocktail event at the Venice Film Festival on Saturday, held in partnership with Variety, saw a heady mix of film executives and artists mingle at the sea terrace of the plush Excelsior hotel. Presiding over proceedings was Unifrance executive director Daniela Elstner and artists present included director Romain Gavras and actor Ouassini Embarek, whose film “Athena” is in the main competition at the festival. Also attending were actor Swann Arlaud, César winner for “Bloody Milk” and “By the Grace of God,” who is at Venice with his new film “Beating Sun,” by Philippe Petit, who was also present; and filmmaker Audrey Diwan, who won the Venice Golden Lion last year for “Happening” and is serving on the jury this year.

Vincent Cassel is getting some support on the red carpet.

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent Iconoclast, the international production group behind Romain Gavras’ Venice competition film “Athena,” is setting a wide-ranging slate of projects with emerging filmmakers from different audiovisual fields, including Leo Berne from the artists collective Megaforce, and Elias Belkeddar and Said Belktibia from the collective Kourtrajmé. The company is also producing the next projects of Harmony Korine and Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre, among others. In a rare interview, Nicolas Lhermitte, who co-founded Iconoclast with Mourad Belkeddar, says the company has emerged from the pandemic with a record number of developed projects. “We took the opportunity during the pandemic to develop a lot of projects, and today we have around 30 projects in the pipeline, spanning films and series that are set up at our studios in France, the U.S. and Germany,” says Lhermitte, who adds that Iconoclast aspired to “accompany multi-disciplinary artists to venture from one field to another, films, TV series, branded content, and music videos.”

Romain Gavras’ immersive modern tragedy Athena just had its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival, receiving a 4 1/2-minute standing ovation in the process.

Designed as something akin to a Greek tragedy for today’s moment, Venice Film Festival Competition title Athena is a torrent, an inundation, a cascade of rage, fury and frustration over the realities of life for a particular group of French families. Such conditions exist in most societies, some more dire than others, but here the wages of pent-up anger are presented with a single-minded intensity and extended duration that would be hard to exceed.

Peter Debruge Chief Film Critic There is no Athena housing project in Paris. That’s a name invented by “Athena” director Romain Gavras and partner in crime Ladj Ly for the banlieu apartment block that becomes a kind of makeshift fortress in an epic standoff between residents — first- and second-generation Black and Arab immigrants tired of being mistreated — and the French national police. Naming it thus lends what unfolds there a classical resonance, one that ties Gavras’ astonishing third feature to the tradition of Greek tragedy, though the situation could hardly be more timely. “Athena” tells the story of four brothers, one murdered on camera by a group of unidentified men in police uniforms, the three others torn about what to do next. Who were these assailants, shown stomping an innocent 13-year-old to death? Why does the French police seem to be protecting the culprits? And what will it take to obtain justice?

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent After the edgy crime comedy “The World Is Yours,” Romain Gavras is back with thriller “Athena.” Produced by Paris-based Iconoclast for Netflix, the ambitious, €15 million film ($15 million) unfolds in the aftermath of the tragic killing of a young boy. A leaked video showing the boy as a victim of police brutality goes viral and ignites an all-out war in an imaginary community called Athena. It’s the first French movie that Netflix is presenting in competition at the Venice Film Festival. “Athena” tells the story of the boy’s three siblings, who are responding to the tragedy in different ways. French star Dali Benssalah (“Les Sauvages,” “No Time to Die”) plays the older brother, Abdel, a French soldier. Faced with an impossible moral dilemma, Abdel is called back from the frontline to help diffuse the all-out war that has been sparked by his younger brother Karim (Sami Slimane), who wants revenge. Athena becomes the backdrop of a tragedy for both the family and its entire community. The film’s stellar cast also includes Ouassini Embarek, Anthony Bajon and Alexis Manenti.

Ben Croll Exploring Paris’ working-class suburbs with a fresh set of eyes while reframing the immigrant experience under a more incisive lens, a dynamic generation is blazing new trails in French cinema. And if artists like “Saint Omer” filmmaker Alice Diop, “Athena” co-writer Ladj Ly, and “The Gravity” writer/director Cedric Ido share little in common but age – interestingly enough, all were born within one or two years of one another – the group’s shared spotlight in Venice and Toronto certainly reflects a rise in opportunity for diverse perspectives. “Today, we do see renewal,” says Unifrance managing director Daniela Elstner. “There’s an altogether new breath, a young generation looking to change, to dare, and to propose new kinds of films, [and with that] a willingness on the part of festival programmers to welcome these filmmakers into main competitions a little bit faster than before.”