Venice
If you walked past the Palazzo del Cinema, the grand home of the Venice Film Festival for more than six decades, you'd have noticed something a little different this year. Just behind the well-trodden red carpet, suspended in a hole in the wall above a pile of bricks, was a large wrecking ball. It was a clumsy reminder that work will begin next year on a new building on the Lido waterfront featuring 11 cinemas, but its symbolism could be read in various ways.
Festival director Marco Mueller might say it shows how this year's festival has smashed new barriers. Or, after the launch of the rival Rome Film Festival last October, others might argue that it represents the demolition of the old to make way for the new.
The truth is somewhere in between. From its lineup of Hollywood stars to its retrospective of spaghetti westerns, the 64th Venice Film Festival could hardly have been called ground-breaking. But then it wasn't meant to be. Venice has always been about glamour, and from appearances by Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie to George Clooney and Keira Knightley, there was no shortage of stars.
And although this year's festival in Rome promises its fair share of stars, Venice more than held its own at the end of a difficult 12 months. What helped most was that its selection - safe and predictable though it was - turned out to be very respectable.
It was another fine year for Asian films - or at least for Taiwanese director Ang Lee, who took home his second Golden Lion prize in three years, having won with his gay cowboy tale Brokeback Mountain. This time, in the slow-burning espionage tale Lust, Caution, the sex was straight - although no less controversial. Set in Japanese-occupied Shanghai during the second world war, the film features violent love scenes that prompted inevitable gossip about whether actors Tony Leung Chiu-wai and newcomer Tang Wei had sex on the set. 'It's clear to me,' the director said ambiguously, quite happy to let the speculation continue. One thing is clear: it's an immaculate piece of filmmaking.