Penelope Cruz broke out into uncontrollable sobs as she kissed her husband and co-star Javier Bardem during the incredibly long 15.5-minute standing ovation at the premiere of “Bunker” at the Venice Film Festival Tuesday night. That made “Bunker” the winner of Venice 2026 (so far) for the most enthusiastic reception, and it fell just shy of one of the longest standing ovations of recent memory for Pedro Almodovar’s “The Room Next Door’ (which had the Lido crowd clapping for 17 minutes in 2024). As the ovation raged on past the 10-minute mark, Cruz mouthed “Thank you!” to fans and paused to shake the hand of one particularly enthusiastic admirer behind her.
As they finally made their exit, Cruz paused on the way out of the Palazzo del Cinema to say “Ciao!” to fans and graciously accept their praise. Director Florian Zeller instructed his cast, which included Patrick Schwarzenegger and Paul Dano, to individually step forward and receive applause during the ecstatic reception. Their marriage begins to unravel after Miguel, an architect, agrees to build a survivalist bunker for Andrew, a tech billionaire played by Dano.
The morally dubious assignment opens up a rift between the couple after 17 years together, as Sofia begins questioning whether they still share the same values and starts working with a handsome American novelist Jeremy Gray (Schwarzenegger). Cruz, wearing a ravishing red dress, collected flowers from fans and posed for selfies on the carpet beforehand. With its glamorous cast and Zeller’s auteur pedigree, “Bunker” ranks among the biggest international movies hitting the fall festival circuit this year.
The film also brings Zeller back to Venice, where “The Son” competed for the Golden Lion in 2022. Zeller was already an acclaimed playwright when he made a successful leap into cinema with “The Father,” which won a pair of Oscars for Anthony Hopkins’ lead performance and for best adapted screenplay, shared by Zeller and Christopher Hampton. Sony Pictures Classics acquired rights to “Bunker” for North America, among other territories, and is planning an awards-qualifying run at the end of the year ahead of an early 2027 U.S. theatrical release.
The company — which previously campaigned for “The Father” that earned six Oscar nominations, including best picture — is certainly hoping Cruz and Bardem’s visceral performances in the film will propel it in the awards conversation. The film is produced by Federica Sainte-Rose and Zeller through their Blue Morning Pictures, a Mediawan banner, alongside Fernando Bovaira and Simon de Santiago of MOD Producciones. FilmNation Entertainment is handling international sales.
Zeller told Variety in an interview before Venice that Stanley Kubrick’s “Eyes Wide Shut” was a key inspiration for the film. Like Kubrick, who cast the then-married Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman as a couple whose relationship is unraveling, Zeller wanted to exploit the permeability between fiction and reality by putting Cruz and Bardem — partners for nearly two decades — on screen as husband and wife. With Cruz and Bardem, he wanted to use “what they are to touch on something more authentic and more unsettling for the audience.” The film also takes aim at the extreme wealth and isolation of the billionaire class, with Zeller saying Cruz brought her own “genuine anger” toward tech billionaires to Sofia.
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