Venice Film Festival defends Roman Polanski, Woody Allen invites

Go jump in a canal.

Venice Film Festival artistic director Alberto Barbera is refusing to row back on his decision to invite controversial movie-biz bigwigs Roman Polanski, Woody Allen and Luc Besson to the late summer event, which will take place despite the potential disruption by the ongoing SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes.

“Luc Besson has been recently fully cleared of any accusations. Woody Allen went under legal scrutiny twice at the end of the ’90s and was absolved,” Barbera said in a new interview with Variety. “With them, I don’t see what the issue is.”

Polanski, Allen and Besson have been publicly accused of varying degrees of sexual misconduct, over a period of years.

In the case of Besson, Barbera was referring to the rape accusation of which the director was cleared last month in a French court. Since 2018, Besson has had multiple charges of sexual misconduct leveled against him, though he denies any wrongdoing.

Allen, on the other hand, was New York’s indie darling for decades, before being accused of sexually abusing his stepdaughter Dylan when she was 7 years old. Allen has repeatedly denied the allegation and has never been charged.

Polanski is the only one of the three to have admitted to alleged sexual wrongdoing. In 1977, the 43-year-old director was charged in California with six offenses against a 13-year-old girl, including rape by use of drugs.

Polanski agreed to plea guilty to the least serious of the charges — “unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor.” However, he fled to Europe before his full 90-day jail sentence could be served. He hasn’t set foot in the United States since 1978.

In this latter case, Barbera called the situation “paradoxical.”

“Polanski has admitted his responsibility,” the festival director said. “I think that to keep beating on Polanski means seeking a scapegoat for other situations that would deserve more attention.”

Barbera also confirmed that Allen would be at his film’s premiere “for sure.”