Director Mani Ratnam will be honoured with ‘Jaeger-LeCoultre Glory to the Filmmaker Award’ at the 67th Venice Film Festival to be held from September 1 to 11 this year. The Venice Film Festival (Italian Mostra Internazionale d'Arte Cinematografica) is the oldest film festival in the world.

Announcing this at Cannes, before the launch of Mani Ratnam’s ‘Villain’, Venice Film Festival director Marco Muller said: “Mani Ratnam is one of the greatest innovators in contemporary Indian cinema. He helped introduce the auteur concept to contemporary Bollywood. We are very proud to honour the work of the great Indian director Mani Ratnam.”

On the occasion of the award ceremony, the 67th Mostra will present the festival premiere of Mani Ratnam’s much-anticipated forthcoming film ‘Raavan’, attended by the director and by the stars Aishwarya Rai, Abhishek Bachchan, Vikram, and A.R. Rahman.

Muller added, “Villain will enchant audiences with its stirring drama and entrancing musical sequences. We are proud to be hosting the festival premiere of this wonderful film, which will be presented at the 2010 Mostra in its both Hindi and Tamil version”.