Venice film festival

Cameras at the ready for Brooklyn's Finest (aka Ethan Hawke, Wesley Snipes, Shannon Kane and Antoine Fuqua). Brooklyn's Finest? Might this conceivably count as a case of false advertising? Photograph: Giuliano Koren/Liverani/AdMedia

Brining a dash of class to proceedings, Basma Hassan and Omar Sharif attend the Al Mosafer" (The Traveller) premiere. Even the professional, Sharif requests that the kisses wait until the paps have got their pictures Photograph: Alessandro Bianchi/Reuters

Chinese actor Huang Lu plays a woman on the run in the Sri Lankan drama Between Two Worlds. Yet here on the red carpet she's positively dawdling Photograph: Dominique Charriau/WireImage.com

Jane Birkin and co-star Sergio Castellitto stage an impromptu show outside the premiere of 36 Vues du Pic Saint. Fittingly, Jacques Rivette's film casts her as a circus acrobat and him as her behind-the-scenes adviser Photograph: Tony Gentile/Reuters

Director Grant Heslov comes bookended by Ewan McGregor and George Clooney. All three are in town to plug their festival contender, The Men Who Stare at Goats Photograph: Stefania D'Alessandro/BEI / Rex Features

George Clooney is ... the Man Who Stares at Goats. He stares for so long, in fact, that his companions have now gone inside, bought some popcorn and commenced to flirting with the usherettes Photograph: Richard Dean/Capital Pictures

Now bring on the cast and crew of the Informant! (a film so good that its title must be screamed at top volume). It is a film by Steven Soderbergh! It is a film starring Matt Damon! And it is playing! At the Venice film festival! Photograph: Francois Durand/Getty Images

And look! This is Matt Damon from out of The Informant! But are his hands raised in triumph or surrender? Photograph: Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images

It is the first rule of Hollywood that you can never have too much Matt. Here is Damon (who stars in The Informant!) with his wife, Luciana Bozan Barroso Photograph: Francois Durand/Getty Images

We repeat: there is no such thing as too much Matt. The very notion is laughable. And so here he is again, this time alongside director Steven Soderbergh. Apparently their latest movie is called The Informant!! Photograph: Lorenzo Santini/Lorenzo Santini/FilmMagic.com

Still no sign of the Scarlet Spittoon. Instead, the crowds thronged to see Tilda Swinton walk up a carpet to see Oliver Stone's South of the Border. Lurking in the background, presumably, is the Hollywood actor Matt Damon Photograph: David Fisher/Rex Features

And then, at long last, the award we've all been waiting for. Ewan McGregor is announced as the proud winner of the Scarlet Spittoon (otherwise known as a Murano vase). Why McGregor? Why a vase? Why the exclamation mark on The Informant!? These were just three of the myriad questions posed by this year's Venice international film festival Photograph: Venturelli/WireImage.com