Dio ride, written and directed by Giovanni Veronesi (The King’s Musketeers, Manual of Love, For Love, Only for Love), is the out-of-competition, closing film of the 83rd Venice International Film Festival of the Biennale di Venezia, directed by Alberto Barbera (2-12 September 2026).
Dio ride will have its world premiere screening on Saturday 12 September, in the Sala Grande of the Palazzo del Cinema on the Lido di Venezia, after the awards ceremony.
The film’s director, Veronesi, stated: “I struggle to express my emotions well; I find it difficult to admit when I’m thrilled or happy.
“However, this time, the invitation to the Venice Film Festival left me surprised and honoured. I am happy – there, I’ve said it.”
The festival’s director Barbera added: “We will close on a high note thanks to Giovanni Veronesi and his magnificent cast, to whom we owe the successful blend of irony and lightness applied to a traditionally serious topic.
“It is a tone that belongs to the finest tradition of a certain Italian cinema, one that has been overlooked for far too long.”
Set in the mid-1600s and loosely based on true events, the movie “resonates strongly with the present time through a story that centers on freedom, the power of the truth, and the relationship between people and power, with its shadows and contradictions”, reads the synopsis.
“With his profound humanity, the friar Frate Leopoldo will change the lives of the people he encounters.”
