Spike Lee Set for Torino Film Festival Award Ahead of ‘Highest 2 Lowest’ Italian Premiere

Spike Lee will be honored with a lifetime achievement award at the Torino Film Festival in Turin, where the Oscar-winning director will launch his Akira Kurosawa-inspired kidnapping drama “Highest 2 Lowest” in Italy.

Lee’s latest film — a reimagining of Kurosawa’s 1963 crime thriller “High and Low” starring Denzel Washington and hailing from Apple Original Films and A24 — world premiered at Cannes. It sees Washington play a music mogul who faces a series of big moral choices.

The director most recently travelled to Italy in March to meet with iconic Italian singer Adriano Celentano, a variation of whose hit song “Prisencolinensinainciusol” features in “Highest 2 Lowest” recorded by Aiyana-Lee with the title “Prisencolin (Americano Joint).”

Lee is an Academy Award winner for “BlacKkKlansman” in adapted screenplay and an honorary Oscar recipient in 2016. His other most notable films include “Do the Right Thing,” “Malcolm X” and “4 Little Girls.”

At the Torino fest — which is a preeminent event for young directors and indie cinema run by Italy’s National Film Museum — Lee will hold an onstage conversation and receive the Stella della Mole Award. He will also visit the venerable cinematic shrine housed in the iconic Mole Antonelliana domed tower that has long been known as a treasure trove of movie memorabilia.

“Presenting the Stella della Mole to Spike Lee means celebrating a pioneer: the first great African-American director to have brought his radical and unmistakable voice to the heart of global mainstream cinema, preserving its power intact,” said Torino Film Festival artistic director Giulio Base. “His films combine rigor and passion, politics and music, anger and poetry.”

Torino’s 43nd edition is being held Nov. 21-29 in the Northern Italian city of Turin. The fest’s lineup will be announced on Nov. 7.