Comienza el Festival de Venecia

El actor George Clooney llega a Venecia en un taxi acuático para celebrar el 65° Festival Internacional de Cine.

Venice Film Festival gets underway

One of the big annual events in the world of film-making, the Venice Film Festival, gets underway later today. It opens with the latest work written and directed by the Coen Brothers, starring Brad Pitt and George Clooney.

Vincent Dowd reports from Venice:

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The organisers of the 65th Venice Film Festival will be relieved to have secured a major American movie to kick off with this year. Burn After Reading is a comedy about the CIA from the Oscar-winning brothers, Joel and Ethan Coen.

Venice has sometimes been the launch pad for films which went on to do well in the Academy Awards - but the effects of the Hollywood writers' strike mean the US presence is slightly down this year. But the attendance of Brad Pitt and George Clooney at the Burn After Reading premiere will give Venice some star-power, even though the film isn't actually in competition.

The seven-member jury - headed by the German director Wim Wenders - have until a week on Saturday to choose the best of the 21 films in the main competition. Four of those films are Italian - an unusually high number. But there are new works too from Ethiopia, Algeria and a Japanese-Brazilian co-production. And one of the US movies is directed by Amir Naderi, who started his movie career in his native Iran.

As these big film festivals show, the world of cinema gets more international by the year.

Vincent Dowd, BBC News, Venice

 Listen to the words

will be relieved to have secured
estarán aliviados de haber conseguido (una importante película para la inauguración)

to kick off
literalmente significa 'el saque inicial' de un partido (de fútbol), pero en este caso quieren decir lanzar o inaugurar

the launch pad
(Festival de Cine ha sido a veces) una plataforma de lanzamiento

went on to do well
(muchas películas) que después tuvieron éxito (en los Premios Oscar)

the effects
los efectos o las consecuencias (de la huelga de guionistas en EE.UU.)

the US presence is slightly down
la presencia estadounidense se ha reducido

premiere
estreno

star-power
(el festival cuenta con) la presencia de estrellas de renombre

until a week on Saturday
(el jurado tiene) ocho días a partir de este sábado, es decir, no este sábado sino el siguiente

by the year
cada año

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