George Clooney, director of Suburbicon. [Photo/Agencies]

VENICE－The 74th Venice film festival opened on Wednesday with Alexander Payne's sci-fi satire Downsizing in the opening slot that is increasingly coveted as a launchpad for the Oscars.

Starring Matt Damon and Kristen Wiig, Sideways director Payne's latest quirky creation is a tale of a lower middle-class couple in the US Midwest. But the new film's title is not a reference to job losses or selling off the family house. Instead the pair are considering signing up for radical new surgery that would help them become tiny versions of themselves, on the promise of a better life.

Written by Payne, a two-time Oscar winner for his screenplays, and Jim Taylor, the film will be seeking to emulate the success of La La Land, Birdman and Gravity－all Venice openers in recent years that went on to bag the Oscars and other prizes. Whether it does is likely to depend on how critics react to the film's intriguing plot, which Variety described as "Honey I Shrunk the Kids with a deeper social message".

Also being unveiled on the opening day is Nico, a bio-pic focusing on the final years of the Velvet Underground singer and Andy Warhol muse that is being shown in the festival's Horizons section dedicated to cutting-edge productions.

Directed by Susanna Nicchiarelli, with Danish actress Trine Dryholm in the lead role, the story catches up with one of 1970s New York's iconic figures in 1987 and 1988, the last two years of her life. It finds her battling a heroin habit but also finding fulfillment through her music and her relationship with her son.

Downsizing is one of 21 films competing for Venice's top prize, the Golden Lion, which will be handed out on Sept 9, along with a string of other awards.

As usual the international film lineup at Venice ranges from big-budget Hollywood productions, including George Clooney's sixth directorial outing, Suburbicon, to new works by indie favorites Andrew Haigh and Warwick Thornton. In total, 71 new full-length films will be shown over the next 10 days, along with 16 short films and two TV series.

Spanish superstar duo Javier Bardem and Penelope Cruz team up again for a new drama about Pablo Escobar, Loving Pablo, in which Bardem plays the Colombian drug baron and Cruz his long-term mistress.

Bardem is also to be seen playing opposite Jennifer Lawrence in Mother!, a new film by Black Swan director Darren Aronofsky, that is one of several thrillers vying for honors.

Another spine-chiller features Ethan Hawke in Paul Schrader's First Reformed, which turns around a dark secret harbored by members of a church who are tormented by the deaths of loved ones.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE