Luca Guadagnino's Challengers No Longer Set to Open Venice Film Festival

Initially set to open this year's Venice Film Festival, Luca Guadagnino's Challengers starring Zendaya, Josh O'Connor and Mike Faist, will now set its sights on an early summer 2024 release.

This decision comes amidst the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes, which has filmmakers standing in solidarity around the world.

As per IMDb, Challengers follows three players who knew each other when they were teenagers as they compete in a tennis tournament to be the world-famous grand slam winner, and reignite old rivalries on and off the court.

Guadagnino is known for his most recent film, Bones and All, as well as his Academy Award-winning Call Me By Your Name. Challengers has been highly anticipated by fans since the trailer dropped last month.

Italian film, Comandante, directed by Edoardo De Angelis, will now replace it as the Venice opener.

Comandante is about Salvatore Todaro, captain of the Cappellini. The synopsis shared by La Biennale di Venezia reads:

At the start of WWII, Salvatore Todaro commands the Italian Royal Navy submarine Cappellini. One dark night in October 1940, while navigating in the Atlantic, he comes upon an armed merchant ship sailing with lights out. He shoots his cannons at the ship and sinks it. At that moment, the Commander makes a decision that was destined to go down in history: he saves the 26 shipwrecked Belgians who otherwise would have drowned in the middle of the ocean and disembarks them at the nearest safe harbor, as prescribed by the law of the sea. To make room for them on board his submarine, he is forced to navigate on the surface of the water for three days, visible to the enemy forces and endangering his life and that of his men.

Edoardo De Angelis told La Biennale di Venezia, "It is a great honor for us to open the 80th Venice International Film Festival, and we thank the Director, Barbera".