Venice honors Italian director

Italian filmmaker Marco Bellocchio will be honored at the Venice Film Festival this year with a Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement, CBC News reported.

The festival, running Aug 31 to Sept 10, called the 71-year-old director and actor "one of the greatest and most influential filmmakers of recent decades."

Bellocchio's most recent hit was 2009's Vincere, based on the life of Benito Mussolini's first wife, Ida Dalser. It captured four awards at the Chicago International Film Festival and was the only Italian entry at the Cannes Film Festival that year.