At the Venice Film Festival, Chinese director Lan Hongchun is promoting his sleeper hit Dear You, a $2 million family drama that unexpectedly grossed $300 million in China, while Chinese tech firm Honor uses the festival to showcase new smartphone hardware aimed at content creators. The pairing reflects a wider push, backed by Venice's Chinese-language film promotion programme, to highlight both grassroots filmmaking success and accessible creative technology, with Honor positioned as the event's official imaging partner.

Honor unveiled its Magic9 Pro Max at a film festival for the first time, alongside its Robot Phone, both developed with German camera maker Arri and marketed as portable cinema cameras. The Magic9 Pro Max, styled after Arri's professional cameras, launches officially in late September, while the Robot Phone features a 200MP camera stabilised by a robotic gimbal arm capable of rotating up to 180 degrees, along with AI object tracking and automated "SpinShot" filming. Arri's chief product officer, David Bermbach, said the collaboration aims to give everyday creators greater control and cinematic-quality imaging tools.