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George Clooney, Brad Pitt are Lone 'Wolfs' at Venice

George Clooney attends a special screening of "The Boys in the Boat" in New York on Dec. 13, 2023. (AP)
George Clooney attends a special screening of "The Boys in the Boat" in New York on Dec. 13, 2023. (AP)
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George Clooney, Brad Pitt are Lone 'Wolfs' at Venice

George Clooney attends a special screening of "The Boys in the Boat" in New York on Dec. 13, 2023. (AP)
George Clooney attends a special screening of "The Boys in the Boat" in New York on Dec. 13, 2023. (AP)

Hollywood's two top leading men -- George Clooney and Brad Pitt -- promise to set the Venice Film Festival alight on Sunday with the premiere of their new film "Wolfs".
The action comedy, pitting one professional "lone wolf" fixer against another, is one of the highlights of the 10-day festival, where it is playing out of competition on the glamorous Lido, AFP reported.
Fans will be sure to await the arrival of the dashing movie stars by water taxi from Venice, with a world premiere scheduled for Sunday evening.
The 81st edition of the world's oldest film festival has been awash with stars this year, with Clooney and Pitt following on the red carpet Nicole Kidman, Cate Blanchett and Angelina Jolie -- Pitt's ex-wife.
Expected Monday will be Julianne Moore and Tilda Swinton, starring in a new film from Spain's Pedro Almodovar, while Lady Gaga and Joaquin Phoenix will dominate Wednesday's festivities with the premiere of the sequel to "Joker", "Joker: Folie a Deux".
In the Apple TV+ production from US director Jon Watts, Clooney and Pitt play professional "lone wolf" fixers forced to work together when both are called in to clean up after a high-profile crime.
More than colleagues, Clooney and Pitt are accomplices, with an easy rapport and self-deprecating humor that the Coen brothers tapped in 2008's "Burn After Reading", or on display in the trilogy of heist films "Ocean's Eleven" (2001-2007).
With "Wolfs", the characters "find their night spiraling out of control in ways that neither one of them expected", explains the production, which has already announced a sequel.
Watts comes to "Wolfs" after directing the "Spider-Man: Homecoming" trilogy starring Tom Holland and Zendaya.
The film will have only a limited theatrical release before going to streaming around the world on Apple TV+ September 27.
Sunday's offerings also include the premiere of "The Brutalist" from US director Brady Corbet, a three-and-a-half-hour film that sees Adrien Brody play a Hungarian Jewish architect embarking on a life-changing project.
On Monday, Almodovar returns to the Lido with his first full-length film in English, "The Room Next Door", with Moore and Swinton, while Daniel Craig is the star of Tuesday's premiere of "Queer", an adaptation of the William Burroughs novel set in 1940s Mexico City.

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André 3000's Alt-Jazz, ‘No Bars’ Solo Album Stunned Fans. Now, It’s up for Grammys

André Benjamin, also known as Andre 3000, arrives at the 30th Film Independent Spirit Awards in Santa Monica, Calif., on Feb. 21, 2015. (AP)
André Benjamin, also known as Andre 3000, arrives at the 30th Film Independent Spirit Awards in Santa Monica, Calif., on Feb. 21, 2015. (AP)
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André 3000's Alt-Jazz, ‘No Bars’ Solo Album Stunned Fans. Now, It’s up for Grammys

André Benjamin, also known as Andre 3000, arrives at the 30th Film Independent Spirit Awards in Santa Monica, Calif., on Feb. 21, 2015. (AP)
André Benjamin, also known as Andre 3000, arrives at the 30th Film Independent Spirit Awards in Santa Monica, Calif., on Feb. 21, 2015. (AP)

No one was expecting it. Late last year, André 3000 released his debut solo album, "New Blue Sun," 18 years after his legendary rap group Outkast's last studio album, "Idlewild."

But "New Blue Sun" has "no bars," he jokes. It's a divergence from rap because "there was nothing I was liking enough to rap about, or I didn't feel it sounded fresh. I'm not about to serve you un-fresh (expletive.)"

Instead, he offered up a six-track instrumental album of ambient alt-jazz — with special attention paid to the flute.

"The sound, that's how I got into it," he says of the instrument. "The portability, too. You can't tote around a piano and play in Starbucks."

He's also invested in the flute's history — like learning about Mayan flutes made from clay, a design he had re-created in cedarwood. "There’s all kinds of fables and, you know, indigenous stories that go along with playing the flute — playing like the birds or playing your heart like the wind — it kind of met (me) where I was in life," he says.

"Flutes — wind instruments in general — are the closest thing you get to actually hearing a human," he continues. "You're actually hearing the breath of a person."

"New Blue Sun" is a stunning collection, one that has earned André 3000 three new Grammy Award nominations: album of the year, alternative jazz, and instrumental composition. Those arrive exactly 25 years after the 1999 Grammys, where Outkast received their first nomination — for "Rosa Parks," from their third album, "Aquemini" — and 20 years after the group won album of the year for "Speakerboxxx/The Love Below."

"It matters because we all want to be acknowledged or recognized," André 3000 says of his new Grammy nominations. "It's a type of proof of connection, in some type of way ... especially with the Grammys, because it's voted on by a committee of musicians and people in the industry."

He's a bit surprised by the attention, too, given the type of album he created. "We have no singles on the radio, not even singles that are hot in the street," he says. "When you're sitting next to Beyoncé and Taylor Swift, these are highly, hugely popular music artists, I'm satisfied just because of that ... we won just to be a part of the whole conversation."

He theorizes that it may be because popular music listening habits are broadening. "A lot of artists are just trying different things. Even, you know, the album that Beyoncé is nominated for, it’s not her normal thing," he says of her country-and-then-some record, "Cowboy Carter.We’re in this place where things are kind of shifting and moving."

For André 3000, "New Blue Sun" has allowed him to "feel like a whole new artist," but it is also an extension of who he's always been. "Being on the road with Outkast and picking up a bass clarinet at a pawn shop in New York and just sitting on the back of the bus playing with it — these things have been around," he says.

He's also always embraced "newness," as he puts it, experimenting creatively "even if it sounds non-masterful."

"Even producing for Outkast, I was just learning these instruments. If I ... put my hands down and play ‘Ms. Jackson,’ I'm not knowing what I'm playing. But I like it," he says.

As for a new Outkast album, "I never say never," he says. "But I can say that the older I get, I feel like that time has happened."