Nearly four-hour black and white revenge drama 'Ang Babaeng Humayo' (The Woman Who Left) of Philippine director Lav Diaz earned the Golden Lion for best film at the 73 Venice Film Festival.

The film, nominally inspired by Leo Tolstoy’s 1872 short story God Sees the Truth, But Waits, plays with the theme of moral accountability within a narrative colored by kidnappings, transgenderism and poverty.

The fashion designer Tom Ford’s thriller Nocturnal Animals won the runner-up Grand Jury prize , while the Best Director award was shared by Mexico’s Amat Escalante for La Region Salvaje (The Untamed) and Russia’s Andrei Konchalovsky for the Holocaust drama Rai (Paradise).

The Best Actor award went to Argentine actor Oscar Martinez for his performance in the comedy-drama El Ciudadano Ilustre (The Distinguished Citizen), and Emma Stone took the Best Actress prize for her role in the musical La La Land.

“This is for my country, for the Filipino people, for our struggle, for the struggle of humanity,” the 57-year-old Mr. Diaz said as he accepted the Golden Lion. “Cinema is still very young, you can still push it,” he said.

There were twenty U.S. and international movies featuring top Hollywood talent and auteur directors were in competition at the world’s oldest film festival. The event is seen as a launching pad for the industry’s award season.

All the movies that won awards were examples of directors’ “lack of compromise, (their) imagination, original vision, daring, and a kind of pure identity,” said Sam Mendes, known for directing James Bond movies Skyfall and Spectre, who headed the jury. “It’s taken me out of my comfort zone.”

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Nandini