Photos: Judi Dench at Crowd-Favorite "Philomena" Venice Screening

The 78-year old British powerhouse Dame Judi Dench inspired some headlines in an ivory gown at the screening of her new film "Philomena" yesterday at the 70th Venice International Film Festival. She walked the carpet alongside her co-stars Steve Coogan, who also co-wrote the script, Sophie Kennedy Clark and acclaimed director Stephen Frears (The Queen). The LA Times calls the film, which reportedly had the audience in tears and stitches, "hard-to-resist Oscar bait."

The film, selected for the festival's official competition and already earning rave reviews as one of the festival's top contenders, follows an Irishwoman's decades-long search for son who, born out of wedlock when she was 16, was taken from her by Catholic nuns at the Roscrea convent for "fallen women." Fifty years later, she seeks the help of an ex-BBC journalist, based on the real-life Martin Sixsmith who's report on the real-life Philomena Lee brought her story to the world stage.

At a press conference for the film yesterday, Dench, who met the real Philomena several times before making the film, said it was a "shockingly terrible story, and it rightly should be told." She later said, "I can only say that I can't imagine myself being in that position and being able to forgive... I don't have the scope of humanity that Philomena has. It would be wonderful to say that yes, if that happened to me, I would be able to do that, but I can't imagine I would."

Coogan told reporters, "Although it criticises the Church as an institution, it dignifies people with simple faith. It's not a polemic, because an attack would have been too simplistic, and very easy to do. Of all the things that happened in the Church, people who have simple faith are often forgotten, and we wanted to dignify those people."