The 66th annual Venice International Film Festival, was held from 2 to 12 September 2009, at Venice Lido in Italy.
Taiwanese filmmaker Ang Lee was the jury president for the main competition. Italian actress Maria Grazia Cucinotta was the Host of the opening and closing ceremonies. The Golden Lion was awarded to Lebanon by Samuel Maoz.
The festival opened with Baarìa by Giuseppe Tornatore, and the closed with Chengdu, I Love You by Fruit Chan and Cui Jian.
Juries Main competition (Venezia 66) Ang Lee, Taiwanese filmmaker and producer - Jury President Sergei Bodrov, Russian filmmaker and producer Sandrine Bonnaire, French actress and filmmaker Liliana Cavani, Italian filmmaker Joe Dante, American director, producer, editor and actor Anurag Kashyap, Indian director, writer, producer and actor Luciano Ligabue, Italian director, writer and singer-songwriter
Orizzonti Pere Portabella, Spanish politician, director, and producer - Jury President Bady Minck, Luxembourger filmmaker and artist Gina Kim, South Korean filmmaker and academic Garin Nugroho, Indonesian director Gianfranco Rosi, Italian director, cinematographer, producer and screenwriter
Opera Prima ("Luigi de Laurentiis" Award for a Debut Film) Haile Gerima, Ethiopian filmmaker - Jury President Ramin Bahrani, American director and screenwriter Gianni Di Gregorio, Italian director, screenwriter and actor Antoine Fuqua, American director and producer Sam Taylor-Wood, English filmmaker and photographer
Corto-Cortissimo (Short Film Competition) Stuart Gordon, American filmmaker, theater director and playwright - Jury President Steve Ricci, Italian cinematographer, screenwriter and editor Sitora Alieva, Russian artistic director of the International Film Festival Kinotav
Controcampo Italiano Carlo Lizzani, Italian director, screenwriter and critic - Jury President Giulio Questi, Italian director and screenwriter Marina Sanna, Italian chief editor of cinema magazine
Official Sections In Competition The following films were selected for the main competition:
English title Original title Director(s) Production country Accident 意外 Cheang Pou-Soi China（Hong Kong） Around a Small Mountain 36 vues du pic Saint-Loup Jacques Rivette France, Italy Baarìa (opening film) Giuseppe Tornatore Italy, France Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans Werner Herzog United States Between Two Worlds Ahasin Wetei Vimukthi Jayasundara Sri Lanka, France The Big Dream Il grande sogno Michele Placido Italy, France Capitalism: A Love Story Michael Moore United States The Double Hour La doppia ora Giuseppe Capotondi Italy Grandmother Lola Brillante Mendoza France, Philippines Lebanon Samuel Maoz Israel, France, Germany, United Kingdom Life During Wartime Todd Solondz United States Lourdes Jessica Hausner Austria Mr Nobody Jaco Van Dormael Belgium, Canada, France, Germany My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done Werner Herzog United States Persécution Patrice Chéreau France Prince of Tears 淚王子 Yonfan Taiwan The Road John Hillcoat United States A Single Man Tom Ford Soul Kitchen Fatih Akın Germany Survival of the Dead George A. Romero Canada, United States Tetsuo: The Bullet Man Tetsuo Project Shinya Tsukamoto Japan The Traveller المسافر Ahmad Maher Egypt, Italy White Material Claire Denis France The White Space Lo spazio bianco Francesca Comencini Italy Women Without Men Zanan-e bedun-e mardan Shirin Neshat Germany, Austria, France, Italy, Ukraine, Morocco Out of Competition The following films were selected to be screened out of competition:
English title Original title Director(s) Production country Brooklyn's Finest Antoine Fuqua United States Chengdu, I Love You (closing film) 成都我爱你 Fruit Chan and Cui Jian China Delhi-6 Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra India Dev.D Anurag Kashyap Great Directors Angela Ismailos United States Green Days Ruzhaye Sabz Hana Makhmalbaf Iran Gulaal गुलाल Anurag Kashyap India The Hole Joe Dante United States The Informant! Steven Soderbergh The Men Who Stare at Goats Grant Heslov Napoli, Napoli, Napoli Abel Ferrara ItalyL'oro di CubaGiuliano Montaldo Rambo (director's cut) Sylvester Stallone United States REC 2 Jaume Balagueró, Paco Plaza Spain The Red Shadows Le ombre rosse Francesco Maselli Italy Rehearsal for a Sicilian Tragedy Prove per una tragedia siciliana Roman Paska, John Turturro Scheherazade, Tell Me a Story إحكي يا شهرزاد Yousry Nasrallah Egypt South of the Border Oliver Stone United States Valhalla Rising Nicolas Winding Refn Denmark, United Kingdom Yona Yona Penguin よなよなペンギン Rintaro Japan, France
Corto Cortissimo (Short Film Competition) The following films were selected for the Corto Cortissimo (Short film competition) section:
English title Original title Director(s) Production country In competition Felicità Salome Aleksi Georgia The Kinematograph Kinematograf Tomek Baginski Poland I Know There's a Man So Che C'è Un Uomo Gianclaudio Cappai Italy This Is Earth, My Brother To je zemljia, brat moj Jan Cvitkovič Slovenia, Italy Still Birds Alle Fugler Sara Eliassen Norway Bliss O Teu Sorriso Pedro Freire Brazil The Game Il Gioco Adriano Giannini Italy Object #1 Murad Ibragimbekov Russia Girllikeme Rowland Jobson United Kingdom Firstborn Eersgeborene Etienne Kallos South Africa, United States Mom's Vacation Umma-E Huga Kwang-Bok Kim South Korea Storage David Lea United Kingdom Of Clouds and Hands Nuvole, Mani Simone Massi France Sinner Meni Philip Israel Family Jewels Martin Stitt United States, United Kingdom For Two Er Ren Shijie Tan Singapore Bicycle Jitensha Dean Yamada Japan, United States Kingyo Edmund Yeo Japan, MalaysiaOut of CompetitionPlastic Bag (Opening film)Ramin BahraniUnited StatesThe It.Aliens (Closing Film)Clemens Klopfenstein, Lukas KlopfensteinItaly, SwitzerlandSpecial EventsRecordareLeonardo Carrano, Alessandro PierattiniItalyThe City in the SkyLa città nel cieloGiacomo CiminiUnited Kingdom, ItalyThe Second FamilyLa seconda famigliaAlberto Dall'AraItalyEarthTzu Nyen HoSingaporeRadioRiccardo PuglieseUnited States, ItalyWarUerraPaolo SassanelliItalyA la lune montanteAnnarita ZambranoFrance
Orizzonti The following films were selected for the Horizons (Orizzonti) section: {| class="wikitable" style="width:95%; margin-bottom:0px" |- ! English title ! Original title ! width="26%"|Director(s) ! Production country |- | colspan=2| 1428 || data-sort-value="Du" | Haibin Du || China |- | Adrift || data-sort-value="Chuyen"| Choi voi || Bui Thac Chuyen || Vietnam |- | Bets and Wedding Dresses || Tris di donne & abiti nuziali || data-sort-value="Terracciano"| Vincenzo Terracciano || Italy |- | Buried Secrets || Dowaha || data-sort-value="Amari"| Raja Amari || Tunisia |-style="background:#E7CD00;" | Clash || Engkwentro || data-sort-value="Diokno"| Pepe Diokno || Philippines |- | data-sort-value="Color"| The Color of Words || data-sort-value="Colore" | Il colore delle parole || data-sort-value="Puccioni"| Marco Simon Puccioni || Italy |- | Cow || 斗牛 || data-sort-value="Hu" | Guan Hu || China |- | Crush || Korotkoe zamykanie || data-sort-value="Buslov"| Pyotr Buslov, Alexei German Jr., Boris Khlebnikov, Kirill Serebrennikov, Ivan Vyrypaev || Russia |- | colspan=2| Francesca (Opening film)|| data-sort-value="Paunescu" | Bobby Paunescu || Romania |- | I Am Love || Io sono l'amore || data-sort-value="Guadagnino"| Luca Guadagnino || Italy |- | I Travel Because I Have to, I Come Back Because I Love You || Viajo porque preciso, volto porque te amo || data-sort-value="Gomes"| Marcelo Gomes, Karim Aïnouz || Brazil |- | Judge || 透析|| data-sort-value="Liu" | Jie Liu || China |- | data-sort-value="Mans"| The Man's Woman and Other Stories || Aadmi ki Aurat Aur Anya Kahaniya || data-sort-value="Dutta"| Amit Dutta || India |- | colspan=2 data-sort-value="Movie"| The Movie Orgy - Ultimate Version || data-sort-value="Dante"| Joe Dante || United States |- | Once Upon a Time Proletarian || 曾经的无产者 || data-sort-value="Guo"| Xiaolu Guo || China |- | colspan=2 data-sort-value="One A"| The One All Alone || data-sort-value="Scheffer" | Frank Scheffer || Netherlands |- | One-Zero || Wahed-Sefr || data-sort-value="Abou Zekry"| Kamla Abou Zekry || Egypt |- | colspan=2| Paraiso || data-sort-value="Galvez"| Héctor Gálvez || Peru |- | colspan=2| Pepperminta || data-sort-value="Rist"| Pipilotti Rist || Switzerland |- | colspan=2| Repo Chick || data-sort-value="Cox"| Alex Cox || United States |- | Sunstroke || Insolação || data-sort-value="Thomas"| Felipe Hirsch, Daniela Thomas || Brazil |- | Tender Parasites || Zarte Parasiten || data-sort-value="Becker"| Christian Becker, Oliver Schwabe || Germany |- | colspan=2| Totò || data-sort-value="Schreiner" | Peter Schreiner || Austria |- | colspan=2| Villalobos || data-sort-value="Karmakar" | Romuald Karmakar || Germany |- | colspan=2| Woman on Fire Looks for Water || data-sort-value="Jin"| Woo Ming Jin || Malaysia, South Korea |- ! colspan="4" |Horizons Events |- | colspan="2" |Armando Testa - Povero ma moderno |Pappi Corsicato |Italy |- | colspan="2" |The Marriage |Peter Greenaway |Italy, Spain |- |Reading Book of Blockade |Chitaem 'Blokadnuju knigu|Alexander Sokurov |Russia |- | colspan="2" |The Death of Pentheus |Philip Haas |United States |- | colspan="2" |La Bohème |Werner Herzog |United Kingdom |- |Faces of Seoul |Seo-wool eui ul-gul |Gina Kim |United States, South Korea |- | colspan="2" |Hugo en Afrique |Stefano Knuchel |Switzerland |- | colspan="2" |Via della croce |Serena Nono |Italy |- | colspan="2" |Mudanza (short) |Pere Portabella |Spain |- | colspan="2" |Deserto rosa. Luigi Ghirri |Elisabetta Sgarbi |Italy |- |La Danse: The Paris Opera Ballet |La danse - Le ballet de l'Opéra de Paris |Frederick Wiseman |France, United States |- | colspan="2" |Cock-Crow | rowspan="2" |David Zamagni, Nadia Ranocchi | rowspan="2" |Italy |- | colspan="2" |Daimon
Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement As part of the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement 2009, which was conferred to John Lasseter and the Directors of Disney-Pixar, the following American animation films were presented: The Incredibles by Brad Bird Up by Pete Docter, Bob Peterson Toy Story 3-D by John Lasseter Toy Story 2 3-D by John Lasseter, Lee Unkrich, Ash Brannon Finding Nemo by Andrew Stanton, Lee Unkrich
Cortocampo Italiano The following films, representing "new trends in Italian cinema", were screened in this section:
English title Original title Director(s) Cosmonaut Cosmonauta Susanna Nicchiarelli David's Birthday Il Compleanno Marco Filiberti Giuseppe De Santis Carlo Lizzani Hollywood on the Tiber Hollywood sul Tevere Marco Spagnoli In the Eyes Negli occhi Francesco Del Grosso, Daniele Anzellotti The Little Il Piccolo Maurizio Zaccaro Poets Poeti Toni D'Angelo Sputnik 5 Susanna Nicchiarelli Ten Winters Dieci Inverni Valerio Mieli
Italian Retrospective: These Phantoms 2 For this retrospective section on Italian cinema, 39 feature and 26 short films were screened, including documentaries. The films were mainly from the period 1946 - 1971, with a few only films going back to the 1930s and reaching up to 2009.