Venice rolls out red carpet with martial arts epic

George Clooney (L) and Ang Lee at the Venice Film Festival

The line-up at the world's oldest cinema competition was slimmed down to just 56 films after organisers came under fire for overloading the 2004 edition.

But directors say they have stayed faithful to the festival's tradition of variety, with offerings that include a retrospective to commemorate 100 years of Chinese cinema and a tribute to Venice's legendary lover Casanova.

Some of Hollywood's biggest stars are expected to grace the Lido's red carpet. George Clooney's black-and-white McCarthy-era film Goodnight and Good Luck led the line-up of major pictures vying for the Golden Lion with its premiere on last Thursday.

But the honor of stepping out first on to the pine-fringed, beachside walkway will be granted to the flag carrier of Hong Kong action movies, Tsui Hark, with his out-of-competition adventure extravaganza.

Seven Swords, part of a revival of the "wuxia" or martial chivalry genre, is an intense, action-packed tale of morality and heroism Chinese-style, full of brutal sword-fights, elaborate acrobatics and improbable weaponry.

Based on a popular novel by Liang Yu-Shen, the film tells the story of seven unlikely heroes battling to save a village from a mercenary general in the early 17th century.

Tsui, who has said his movie is a homage to Akira Kurosawa's 1954 classic Seven Samurai, said the picture was the first in a series of up to six epics.

Seven Swords kicks off a series of Asian offerings this year, including Korean director Park Chan-wook's Sympathy for Lady Vengeance and Stanley Kwan's Everlasting Regret, starring pop diva Sammi Cheng.

European films featured at the 62nd edition of the festival include the latest film from 96-year-old Portuguese director Manoel de Oliveira and movies starring France's Juliette Binoche and Russia's Nikita Mikhalkov.

Italy's filmmakers have three films in competition, vying for the country's first top prize on home soil since 1996. This year's jury is led by production designer Dante Ferretti, who won an Oscar this year for his work on Martin Scorcese's The Aviator.