Venice Days, an independent platform of the Venice Film Festival, has cancelled the screening of Georgian director Rusudan Glurigidze's second feature film, Antikvariati (Antiques).
Festival organizers have canceled press and industry screenings scheduled for August 28, and public screenings have been removed from the schedule.
The move comes after an emergency ruling by a Venice court and three production companies — Viva Film in Russia, Avantura Film in Croatia, and Pygmalion in Cyprus — over a copyright dispute regarding the film's script, according to a statement from Venice Days.
In its statement, the Venice Days organisation – also known as Days of Authors – said: “We believe, in the spirit of Days of Authors, that our main duty, shared with the Italian filmmakers’ associations that promote our screening, is to defend copyright, and therefore to defend the director Rusudan Glorigidze, who is present in Venice. We also feel that the decision of the judge of the Venice Court should be taken into serious consideration, pending further developments.
“However, we will do everything we can, taking into account the law as well as the filmmaker’s freedom of expression, to support the presence of the work itself and its visibility in Venice in the coming days.”
But it remains unclear what this “vision” might mean in practical terms.
