Golden Lion

Golden Lion

The Golden Lion (Italian: Leone d'oro) is the highest prize given to a film at the Venice Film Festival. The prize was introduced in (/wiki/10thVeniceInternationalFilmFestival) by the organizing committee and is widely regarded as one of the film industry's most prestigious and distinguished prizes. In (/wiki/31stVeniceInternationalFilmFestival), the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement was introduced, an honorary prize for people who have made an important contribution to cinema.

The prize was introduced in 1949 as the Golden Lion of Saint Mark, which was one of the best known symbols of the ancient Republic of Venice. In (/wiki/15thVeniceInternationalFilmFestival), the prize was permanently named the Golden Lion.

History

Golden Lion

A Golden Lion trophy

Roberto Rossellini and Mario Monicelli winning the Golden Lion in 1959 for General Della Rovere and The Great War, respectively

The first Golden Lion was awarded in 1949. Previously, the equivalent prize was the Gran Premio Internazionale di Venezia (Grand International Prize of Venice), awarded in 1947 and 1948. No Golden Lions were awarded between 1969 and 1979. According to the Biennale's official website, the hiatus was a result of the 1968 Lion being given to the radically experimental Die Artisten in der Zirkuskuppel: Ratlos; the website says that the awards "still had a statute dating back to the fascist era and could not side-step the general political climate. Sixty-eight produced a dramatic fracture with the past".

Fourteen French films have been awarded the Golden Lion, more than to any other nation. However, there is considerable geographical diversity in the winners. Nine American filmmakers have won the Golden Lion, with awards for John Cassavetes and Robert Altman (both times the awards were shared with other winners who tied), as well as Ang Lee (Brokeback Mountain was the first winning U.S. film not to tie), Darren Aronofsky, Sofia Coppola, Todd Phillips, Chloé Zhao, Laura Poitras, and Jim Jarmusch.

Prior to 1980, only three of 21 winners were of non-European origin. Since the 1980s, the Golden Lion has been presented to a number of Asian filmmakers, particularly in comparison to the Cannes Film Festival's top prize, the Palme d'Or, which has been awarded to five Asian filmmakers since 1980; the Golden Lion, by contrast, has been awarded to ten Asians during the same time period, with two of these filmmakers winning it twice. Ang Lee won the Golden Lion twice within three years in the 2000s, once for an American film and once for a Chinese-language film. Zhang Yimou has also won twice. Other Asians to win the Golden Lion since 1980 include Jia Zhangke, Hou Hsiao-hsien, Tsai Ming-liang, Trần Anh Hùng, Takeshi Kitano, Kim Ki-duk, Jafar Panahi, Mira Nair, and Lav Diaz. Russian filmmakers have won the Golden Lion several times, including since the end of the USSR.

To date, 33 of the 54 winners have been European men, including Soviet/Russian winners. Since 1949, seven women have won the Golden Lion for directing: Margarethe von Trotta, Agnès Varda, Mira Nair, Sofia Coppola, Chloé Zhao, Audrey Diwan, and Laura Poitras. In 1938, German director Leni Riefenstahl won the Festival when its highest award was the Coppa Mussolini. In 2019, Joker became the first movie based on original comic book characters to win the prize.

Controversies

From 1934 until 1942, the highest award of the festival was the Coppa Mussolini for Best Italian Film and Best Foreign Film. Even though other awards were attributed to Nazi propaganda films, such as Jud Süß (Suss, the Jew), an antisemitic production made at the behest of Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels, won the festival's Golden Crown award in 1940.

Gran Premio Internazionale di Venezia

After the end of the WWII during the reestablishment of the festival, The Southerner, directed by Jean Renoir, won the main prize at the 1946 edition. In 1947 and 1948, the equivalent prize for the Golden Lion was the Gran Premio Internazionale di Venezia (Grand International Prize of Venice), awarded to Karel Steklý's The Strike in 1947 and Laurence Olivier's Hamlet in 1948.

Winners

Golden Lion

These films received the Golden Lions or the major awards of the Venice Film Festival:

Akira Kurosawa won for Rashomon (1950)

Carl Theodor Dreyer won for Ordet (1955)

Satyajit Ray won for Aparajito (1957)

Michelangelo Antonioni won for Red Desert (1964)

Louis Malle won twice for Atlantic City (1980) and Au revoir les enfants (1987)

John Cassavetes won for Gloria (1980)

Jean-Luc Godard won for First Name: Carmen (1983)

Agnès Varda won for Vagabond (1985)

Zhang Yimou won twice for The Story of Qiu Ju (1992) and Not One Less (1999)

Jafar Panahi won for The Circle (2000)

Ang Lee won twice for Brokeback Mountain (2005) and Lust, Caution (2007)

Jia Zhangke won for Still Life (2006)

Sofia Coppola won for Somewhere (2010)

Pedro Almodóvar won for The Room Next Door (2024)

1940s

Year	Title	Director	Production Country
1949	Manon	Henri-Georges Clouzot	France

1950s

Year	English Title	Original Title	Director(s)	Production Country
1950	Justice Is Done	Justice est faite	André Cayatte	France
1951	Rashomon	羅生門	Akira Kurosawa	Japan
1952	Forbidden Games	Jeux interdits	René Clément	France
1953	No award given, the jury was unable to decide the winner and the prize was declared void
1954	Romeo and Juliet	Renato Castellani	United Kingdom
1955	Ordet	Carl Theodor Dreyer	Denmark
1956	No award given, the jury was unable to decide the winner and the prize was declared void
1957	Aparajito	অপরাজিত	Satyajit Ray	India
1958	Rickshaw Man	無法松の一生	Hiroshi Inagaki	Japan
1959	General Della Rovere	Il generale della Rovere	Roberto Rossellini	France, Italy
The Great War	La grande guerra	Mario Monicelli

1960s

<table><thead><tr><th>Year</th><th>English Title</th><th>Original Title</th><th>Director(s)</th><th>Production Country</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>1960</td><td>Tomorrow Is My Turn</td><td>Le Passage du Rhin</td><td>André Cayatte</td><td>France</td></tr><tr><td>1961</td><td>Last Year at Marienbad</td><td>L'année dernière à Marienbad</td><td>Alain Resnais</td></tr><tr><td>1962</td><td>Family Diary</td><td>Cronaca familiare</td><td>Valerio Zurlini</td><td>Italy</td></tr><tr><td>Ivan's Childhood</td><td>Ива́ново де́тство</td><td>Andrei Tarkovsky</td><td>Soviet Union</td></tr><tr><td>1963</td><td>Hands over the City</td><td>Le mani sulla città</td><td>Francesco Rosi</td><td>Italy</td></tr><tr><td>1964</td><td>Red Desert</td><td>Il deserto rosso</td><td>Michelangelo Antonioni</td></tr><tr><td>1965</td><td>Sandra</td><td>Vaghe stelle dell'Orsa ...</td><td>Luchino Visconti</td></tr><tr><td>1966</td><td>The Battle of Algiers</td><td>La battaglia di Algeri</td><td>Gillo Pontecorvo</td><td>Algeria, Italy</td></tr><tr><td>1967</td><td>Belle de Jour</td><td>Luis Buñuel</td><td>France</td></tr><tr><td>1968</td><td>Artists Under the Big Top: Perplexed</td><td>Die Artisten in der Zirkuskuppel: Ratlos</td><td>Alexander Kluge</td><td>West Germany</td></tr><tr><td>1969</td><td>No award given, this edition of the festival was not competitive</td></tr></tbody></table>

1970s

Year	English Title	Original Title	Director(s)	Production Country	Ref.
1970	No award given, the editions of the festival were not competitive
1971
1972
1973	No award given, the festival was not organized during these years
1974
1975
1976
1977	No award given, the festival was not organized this year
1978	No award given, the festival was not organized this year
1979	No award given, this edition of the festival was not competitive

1980s

Year	English Title	Original Title	Director(s)	Production Country
1980	Atlantic City	Louis Malle	Canada, France
Gloria	John Cassavetes	United States
1981	Marianne and Juliane	Die Bleierne Zeit	Margarethe von Trotta	West Germany
1982	The State of Things	Der Stand der Dinge	Wim Wenders
1983	First Name: Carmen	Prénom Carmen	Jean-Luc Godard	France
1984	A Year of the Quiet Sun	Rok spokojnego słońca	Krzysztof Zanussi	Poland
1985	Vagabond	Sans toit ni loi	Agnès Varda	France
1986	The Green Ray	Le Rayon vert	Éric Rohmer
1987	Au revoir les enfants	Louis Malle	France, West Germany
1988	The Legend of the Holy Drinker	La leggenda del santo bevitore	Ermanno Olmi	Italy, France
1989	A City of Sadness	悲情城市	Hou Hsiao-hsien	Taiwan

1990s

<table><thead><tr><th>Year</th><th>English Title</th><th>Original Title</th><th>Director(s)</th><th>Production Country</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>1990</td><td>Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead</td><td>Tom Stoppard</td><td>United Kingdom, United States</td></tr><tr><td>1991</td><td>Close to Eden</td><td>У́рга – территория любви</td><td>Nikita Mikhalkov</td><td>Soviet Union</td></tr><tr><td>1992</td><td>The Story of Qiu Ju</td><td>秋菊打官司</td><td>Zhang Yimou</td><td>China</td></tr><tr><td>1993</td><td>Short Cuts</td><td>Robert Altman</td><td>United States</td></tr><tr><td>Three Colours: Blue</td><td>Trois couleurs: Bleu</td><td>Krzysztof Kieślowski</td><td>France, Poland</td></tr><tr><td>1994</td><td>Before the Rain</td><td>Пред дождот</td><td>Milčo Mančevski</td><td>Macedonia</td></tr><tr><td>Vive L'Amour</td><td>愛情萬歲</td><td>Tsai Ming-liang</td><td>Taiwan</td></tr><tr><td>1995</td><td>Cyclo</td><td>Xích lô</td><td>Anh Hung Tran</td><td>Vietnam, France</td></tr><tr><td>1996</td><td>Michael Collins</td><td>Neil Jordan</td><td>Ireland, United Kingdom</td></tr><tr><td>1997</td><td>Hana-bi</td><td>はなび</td><td>Takeshi Kitano</td><td>Japan</td></tr><tr><td>1998</td><td>The Way We Laughed</td><td>Così ridevano</td><td>Gianni Amelio</td><td>Italy</td></tr><tr><td>1999</td><td>Not One Less</td><td>一個都不能少</td><td>Zhang Yimou</td><td>China</td></tr></tbody></table>

2000s

Year	English Title	Original Title	Director(s)	Production Country
2000	The Circle	دایره	Jafar Panahi	Iran
2001	Monsoon Wedding	Mira Nair	India
2002	The Magdalene Sisters	Peter Mullan	Ireland, United Kingdom
2003	The Return	Возвращение	Andrey Zvyagintsev	Russia
2004	Vera Drake	Mike Leigh	United Kingdom
2005	Brokeback Mountain	Ang Lee	United States
2006	Still Life	三峡好人	Jia Zhangke	China
2007	Lust, Caution	色，戒	Ang Lee	Taiwan, China, United States
2008	The Wrestler	Darren Aronofsky	United States
2009	Lebanon	לבנון	Samuel Maoz	Israel

2010s

Year	English Title	Original Title	Director(s)	Production Country
2010	Somewhere §	Sofia Coppola	United States
2011	Faust §	Фауст	Alexander Sokurov	Russia
2012	Pietà	피에타	Kim Ki-duk	South Korea
2013	Sacro GRA	Gianfranco Rosi	Italy
2014	A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence	En duva satt på en gren och funderade på tillvaron	Roy Andersson	Sweden
2015	From Afar	Desde allá	Lorenzo Vigas	Venezuela
2016	The Woman Who Left	Ang Babaeng Humayo	Lav Diaz	Philippines
2017	The Shape of Water	Guillermo del Toro	United States, Mexico
2018	Roma	Alfonso Cuarón	Mexico, United States
2019	Joker	Todd Phillips	United States

2020s

<table><thead><tr><th>Year</th><th>English Title</th><th>Original Title</th><th>Director(s)</th><th>Production Country</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>2020</td><td>Nomadland</td><td>Chloé Zhao</td><td>United States</td></tr><tr><td>2021</td><td>Happening §</td><td>L'Événement</td><td>Audrey Diwan</td><td>France</td></tr><tr><td>2022</td><td>All the Beauty and the Bloodshed</td><td>Laura Poitras</td><td>United States</td></tr><tr><td>2023</td><td>Poor Things</td><td>Yorgos Lanthimos</td><td>Ireland, United Kingdom, United States</td></tr><tr><td>2024</td><td>The Room Next Door</td><td>La habitación de al lado</td><td>Pedro Almodóvar</td><td>Spain</td></tr><tr><td>2025</td><td>Father Mother Sister Brother</td><td>Jim Jarmusch</td><td>United States, Ireland, France</td></tr></tbody></table>

Notes: § Denotes unanimous win

Multiple winners

Golden Lion

• André Cayatte ((/wiki/11thVeniceInternationalFilmFestival) & (/wiki/21stVeniceInternationalFilmFestival)) • Louis Malle ((/wiki/37thVeniceInternationalFilmFestival) & (/wiki/44thVeniceInternationalFilmFestival)) • Zhang Yimou ((/wiki/49thVeniceInternationalFilmFestival) & (/wiki/56thVeniceInternationalFilmFestival)) • Ang Lee ((/wiki/62ndVeniceInternationalFilmFestival) & (/wiki/64thVeniceInternationalFilmFestival))

Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement

Golden Lion

Marcello Mastroianni receiving the prize in 1990

Steven Spielberg receiving the prize from Gillo Pontecorvo in 1993

Martin Scorsese receiving the prize from Monica Vitti, 1995

Omar Sharif receiving the prize in 2003

<table><thead><tr><th>Year</th><th>Winner(s)</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>1970</td><td>Orson Welles</td></tr><tr><td>1971</td><td>Ingmar Bergman, Marcel Carné, and John Ford</td></tr><tr><td>1972</td><td>Charlie Chaplin, Anatoli Golovnya and Billy Wilder</td></tr><tr><td>1982</td><td>Alessandro Blasetti, Luis Buñuel, Frank Capra, George Cukor, Jean-Luc Godard, Sergei Yutkevich, Alexander Kluge, Akira Kurosawa, Michael Powell, Satyajit Ray, King Vidor, and Cesare Zavattini</td></tr><tr><td>1983</td><td>Michelangelo Antonioni</td></tr><tr><td>1985</td><td>Manoel de Oliveira, John Huston, and Federico Fellini</td></tr><tr><td>1986</td><td>Paolo Taviani and Vittorio Taviani</td></tr><tr><td>1987</td><td>Luigi Comencini and Joseph L. Mankiewicz</td></tr><tr><td>1988</td><td>Joris Ivens</td></tr><tr><td>1989</td><td>Robert Bresson</td></tr><tr><td>1990</td><td>Marcello Mastroianni and Miklós Jancsó</td></tr><tr><td>1991</td><td>Mario Monicelli and Gian Maria Volonté</td></tr><tr><td>1992</td><td>Jeanne Moreau, Francis Ford Coppola, and Paolo Villaggio</td></tr><tr><td>1993</td><td>Steven Spielberg, Robert De Niro, Roman Polanski, and Claudia Cardinale</td></tr><tr><td>1994</td><td>Al Pacino, Suso Cecchi d'Amico, and Ken Loach</td></tr><tr><td>1995</td><td>Woody Allen, Monica Vitti, Martin Scorsese, Alberto Sordi, Ennio Morricone, Giuseppe De Santis, Goffredo Lombardo, and Alain Resnais</td></tr><tr><td>1996</td><td>Robert Altman, Vittorio Gassman, Dustin Hoffman, and Michèle Morgan</td></tr><tr><td>1997</td><td>Gérard Depardieu, Stanley Kubrick, and Alida Valli</td></tr><tr><td>1998</td><td>Warren Beatty, Sophia Loren, and Andrzej Wajda</td></tr><tr><td>1999</td><td>Jerry Lewis</td></tr><tr><td>2000</td><td>Clint Eastwood</td></tr><tr><td>2001</td><td>Éric Rohmer</td></tr><tr><td>2002</td><td>Dino Risi</td></tr><tr><td>2003</td><td>Dino De Laurentiis and Omar Sharif</td></tr><tr><td>2004</td><td>Stanley Donen and Manoel de Oliveira</td></tr><tr><td>2005</td><td>Hayao Miyazaki and Stefania Sandrelli</td></tr><tr><td>2006</td><td>David Lynch</td></tr><tr><td>2007</td><td>Tim Burton and Bernardo Bertolucci (for the last 75 years of the history of cinema)</td></tr><tr><td>2008</td><td>Ermanno Olmi</td></tr><tr><td>2009</td><td>John Lasseter, Brad Bird, Pete Docter, Andrew Stanton, and Lee Unkrich</td></tr><tr><td>2010</td><td>John Woo</td></tr><tr><td>2011</td><td>Marco Bellocchio</td></tr><tr><td>2012</td><td>Francesco Rosi</td></tr><tr><td>2013</td><td>William Friedkin</td></tr><tr><td>2014</td><td>Thelma Schoonmaker and Frederick Wiseman</td></tr><tr><td>2015</td><td>Bertrand Tavernier</td></tr><tr><td>2016</td><td>Jean-Paul Belmondo and Jerzy Skolimowski</td></tr><tr><td>2017</td><td>Jane Fonda and Robert Redford</td></tr><tr><td>2018</td><td>David Cronenberg and Vanessa Redgrave</td></tr><tr><td>2019</td><td>Julie Andrews and Pedro Almodóvar</td></tr><tr><td>2020</td><td>Ann Hui and Tilda Swinton</td></tr><tr><td>2021</td><td>Roberto Benigni and Jamie Lee Curtis</td></tr><tr><td>2022</td><td>Catherine Deneuve and Paul Schrader</td></tr><tr><td>2023</td><td>Liliana Cavani and Tony Leung Chiu-wai</td></tr><tr><td>2024</td><td>Peter Weir and Sigourney Weaver</td></tr><tr><td>2025</td><td>Werner Herzog and Kim Novak</td></tr></tbody></table>