Venice Film Festival director Alberto Barbera has unveiled a 2026 programme combining established auteurs with emerging international filmmakers, but the selection highlights continuing concerns over Hollywood studios’ reduced involvement in major European festivals. The absence of many large studio titles and a less star-heavy red-carpet line-up than last year may affect Venice’s mainstream profile, while raising broader questions about the relationship between festivals and the commercial film industry.

The 83rd festival’s competition includes films starring Robert Pattinson, Penélope Cruz, Javier Bardem, Alicia Vikander and others, alongside new work from Martin McDonagh, Lee Chang-dong and Werner Herzog. Barbera said only nine of the competition’s films come from directors previously selected for Venice, and noted a stronger-than-usual documentary presence after the festival chose to show fewer television series. Of the 20 competition films, however, only one is directed by a woman—May El-Toukhy’s *Woman Unknown*—despite Venice having backed a gender-representation pledge nearly a decade earlier.