ITALY: VENICE FILM FESTIVAL SEES THE PREMIERES OF "ROUNDERS" AND "THE TRUEMAN SHOW"

Record ID: 387795

  • Title: ITALY: VENICE FILM FESTIVAL SEES THE PREMIERES OF "ROUNDERS" AND "THE TRUEMAN SHOW"
  • Date: 5th September 1998
  • Summary: (REUTERS -ACCESS ALL) ) JIM CARREY SAYS, (SOUNDBITE ENGLISH) "I JUST THOUGHT IT WAS A GREAT STORY, I THOUGHT IT WAS SOMETHING THAT KIND OF NEEDS TO BE SAID, IT WAS TOTALLY APPROPRIATE FOR THE TIMES, GOING INTO THE MILLENIUM WE'RE FACED WITH THIS HUGE KIND OF GLUT OF MEDIA AND INSENSITIVTY TOWARDS PEOPLE'S FEELINGS AND ALSO AT THE SAME TIME THERE WERE SO MANY COLOURS TO
  • Embargoed: 20th September 1998 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Italy
  • Country: Italy
  • Reuters ID: LVA4EXK65OSWAEMS6FP3WQIWL6XH
  • Story Text: After being cold-shouldered in last year's line-up, big name U.S fare was out in force over the weekend in Venice's fifty-fifth International Film festival.The World Premiere of
    "Rounders", which stars Matt Damon, Hollywood's 'latest big thing', and the European premiere of Peter Weir's "The Truman Show" with Jim Carrey gave the star-studded fest even more glitz.
    The movie "Rounders" plunged the Venice film festival into the underground world of high-stakes gambling on Saturday.The film stars new Hollywood heart-throb Matt Damon, who plays the poker ace who can't give up the game.
    Damon was catapulted into the limelight with an Oscar for co-writing the screenplay of "Good Will Hunting".He followed that hit with a starring role in Steven Spielberg's acclaimed war movie "Saving Private Ryan".
    On Saturday autograph hunters went wild at the Lido resort, where "Rounders" is competing for the Golden Lion.
    Like "Private Ryan", where he plays the title role in a film being hailed as the most realistic World War Two movie EVER made, "Rounders" forced Damon to do his homework.
    Damon and the cast, including arch-baddie John Malkovich and Bond girl Famke Janssen, watched the real big boys, or rounders, who make their living at the game in New York's poker clubs.
    In the movie, Damon plays Mike, a law student who loses his whole $30,000 "bankroll" in a fatal miscalculation and vows to give up playing.
    But the lure proves too great and soon the stakes are sky-high.Mike (Damon) needs $15,000 by morning to keep the mob off his back.
    It's then that he has to choose between the legal profession or the sleazy world of high stakes poker.
    "Rounders", says director John Dahl, is another take on the old story of one man's journey to pursue his dream.
    The film keeps you hooked on the game's passion and skill, whether you're a poker player or not.
    It's a different kind of game for the cast of another movie,
    "The Truman Show", and it's different kind of gamble for Jim Carrey, who ventures into the realm of serious drama in his leading role in the movie.
    Carrey, famed for his slapstick, comic talents plays Truman Burbank, a seemingly ordinary man with a seemingly ordinary life, job and wife.But nothing is what it seems for Truman, because he lives every moment under the unblinking gaze of thousands of hidden television cameras.Truman is the unwitting star of the longest, most popular documentary soap opera in history.
    Carrey said he couldn't resist the challenge of the role.
    Peter Weir, director of "The Truman Show", who previously worked on "Dead Poet's Society", "The Year of Living Dangerously" and "Gallipoli" didn't fail to notice the irony that his film, would at some stage end up on T.V, just like "The Truman Show".
    Carrey, who has been pursued by the media after speculation over his marriage with on-off wife Lauren Holly, says he feels a certain affinity with Truman Burbank.But his life, he says is more of a documentary, than a soap opera.
    "The Truman Show" was premiered out of competition at the Venice film festival late Sunday evening.Huge crowds turned out catch a glimpse of their favourite stars.The Venice Film Festival runs until September 13.
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