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Another Hollywood heavyweight elicited another warm welcome from festival-goers here and the weekend belonged to Al Pacino, pulling double-duty on the Lido with back-to-back showings, of The Humbling which we told you about yesterday, and David Gordon Green’s Manglehorn. Green was here last year with the Southern Drama Joe whose protagonist (Nicolas Cage) was a misfit in search of redemption.

The HFPA gained plaudits and publicity for giving away almost $2 million at it's grants dinner last month, but its charity work continues throughout the year, as a recent letter from the Small Wonders Foundation to HFPA president Theo Kingma demonstrates. In it, Small Wonders president Thelma Waxman thanked theHFPA for donating a Golden Globe awards celebrity gift bag to the silent auction at the Foundation's fundraising event, Night of Wonders, held in June.

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In a personal letter to HFPA President Theo Kingma, Martin Scorsese, the founder and chairman of the Film Foundation, thanked the HFPA for supporting the restoration of classic films through generous funds. Because of your passionate commitment, writes Mr Scorsese, future generations will experience a wealth of cinematic treasures that would otherwise have been lost.

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One of the – ehm – more unusual rituals here in Venice is the chaos that ensues at the end of every press conference, when dozens of frenzied members of the Four Estate abandon all pretense, bum-rush the stage waving notebooks, pictures and scraps of paper for the stars to autograph. We have seen more dignified displays from the media but, frankly, plenty of worse ones.

There were a wide variety of elegant ball gowns at the 71st Venice Film Festival on August 28, 2014 in Venice, Italy.

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With the sun finally shining brightly over the Excelsior cabanas on Lido beach (and on the hordes of harried reporters rushing between screenings), the Venice festival is nearing its first weekend and gathering steam. One of the themes that is emerging from this edition is that of moral choices, and their consequences.