George Clooney receives Golden Lion, delivers stark warning against politics of fear

Hollywood star George Clooney received the honorary Golden Lion for lifetime achievement at the Venice Film Festival, using the occasion to deliver a powerful defence of storytelling, journalism and human empathy at a time when, he said, people were increasingly being encouraged to fear one another.

The 65-year-old actor-filmmaker attended the festival’s opening ceremony with his wife Amal Clooney and longtime friend Laura Dern, who presented him with the honour.

Dern described Clooney as one of her oldest and closest friends, while several of his friends and collaborators — including Brad Pitt, Adam Sandler, Steven Soderbergh, Alexander Payne and Noah Baumbach — contributed tributes to the actor.

‘We know better’

Reflecting on what he had learnt from attending international film festivals and experiencing world cinema, Clooney said human emotions transcended borders and languages.

“Nobody laughs in a different language. Nobody cries in a different language. Parents worry the same. Kids dream the same,” he said.

Clooney then turned to the current political climate, saying people with power and wealth were increasingly telling societies to fear one another. “But we know better than that, don’t we? Because history does teach us a lesson,” he said.

He argued that authoritarian forces historically sought to silence not only political opponents but journalists and artists capable of challenging simplistic narratives.

“The first people authoritarians try to shut down are not politicians,” Clooney said, pointing instead to journalists who ask questions and filmmakers, writers, actors and musicians who encourage audiences to empathise with people they have never met.

“Stories are always dangerous to people who peddle in fear,” he added, saying those afraid of books, music and stories rarely emerged as the heroes of history.

Cinema and empathy

Clooney acknowledged that films alone could not solve political or economic crises, but argued that cinema retained the ability to build empathy between strangers.

“Movies don’t stop wars. They don’t lower inflation. They don’t fix elections,” he said, adding that films could nevertheless remind people that a stranger might be “the hero in somebody else’s story”.

The actor also injected humour into the occasion, joking that receiving a lifetime achievement award prompted two immediate thoughts — gratitude for the honour and the question: “Do they know something that I don’t?”

Looking back on 45 years as an actor, Clooney described his career less as the product of a carefully designed plan and more as a succession of opportunities and “happy accidents”.

He credited directors, writers, crew members, fellow actors and others who helped him throughout his career, saying the passage of time had taught him that “nobody arrives anywhere on their own”.

Clooney first attended the Venice Film Festival with Steven Soderbergh’s “Out of Sight” in 1998. He subsequently returned with films including “Michael Clayton”, the Coen brothers’ “Burn After Reading” and Alfonso Cuarón’s “Gravity”, as well as his own directorial projects, including “Good Night, and Good Luck”.