Critics and the public are bowing and curtseying both before Stephen Frears's movie and leading lady Helen Mirren in the title role these days, reports Reuters.

    "I thought it was a great film," said Lee Marshall, film critic for Screen International. "It's commercially smart because clearly it is a subject anyone, anywhere in the world knows about and they do it in an irreverent and charming way."

    Other front runners among the 21 films in the main competition include French film maker Alain Resnais's "Private Fears in Public Places" and Mexican director Alfonso Cuaron's "Children of Men."

    Asian flavor

    Venice has kept with tradition by featuring Asian films both in and out of competition, and of the five in the main line-up "Syndromes and a Century" from Thailand and Taiwan's "I Don't Want to Sleep Alone" stand out so far.

    "The Black Dahlia," which enjoyed the fanfare of opening this year's festival, drew mixed reviews. Scarlett Johansson stars in a story based on the grisly true-life murder of aspiring Hollywood actress Elizabeth Short in 1947.

    The similarly themed "Hollywoodland," starring Ben Affleck, Adrien Brody and Diane Lane, takes viewers back to 1959 Los Angeles and centers around the mysterious death of television Superman hero George Reeves.

    Director Paul Verhoeven, most famous for U.S. box office hits "Basic Instinct" and "Total Recall," returned to his native Netherlands to shoot "Black Book," and his high-octane World War II thriller won warm praise from reviewers.

(Source: China Daily/Agencies)