A rainy cloud filled 2024 Christopher Street Day hit the city July 27th. Seventy-five trucks slinked through the capital on a ten kilometre journey finishing in Tiergarten at the Siegessäule Column. The weather did not dampen the spirit, just fewer naked bodies on the parade route. This year’s theme “for diversity and democracy” is a call for different communities to unite during these tense times.
A sad goodbye to Galerias Lafayette Berlin, the five floor department store gave the city a bit of affordable Parisian Chic. After 28 years in the Mitte District, the celebrated building housing French Cuisine, handbags and perfume closes the doors at the end of July. Once a staple for shopping in the city, the establishment fell on hard times before COVID, with the pandemic and slow moving economic challenges, the owners announced the location would shutter back in October 2023. I will miss the baguettes and cheese section.
Many industries converge this week for Green Tech Berlin. Because the topic of sustainability is on everyone’s agenda, we decided to see what happens at this conference with topics on fashion, mobility, technology and travel.
ITB Berlin continued to inspire travellers this past week.
Recent headlines from Berlin’s KaDeWe have painted a dark picture of a once great department now in a fall. Since the last visit to the seven floor luxury emporium two weeks, the situation appears more dire on a Monday afternoon, customers appear to be staying away. More brands have pulled, not selling merchandise, or not restocking. Escalators are not working, employees are milling around staring at their smartphones. The shopping institution future looks uncertain.
The Berlinale must have a deal with Airbnb. Another creative head is relocating to Berlin, the fourth in five years. After the September shock resignation of Chatrian, German Culture Minister Claudia Roth announced she and a replacement committee would actively seek one artistic head instead of a duo team. Minister Roth felt the festival needed a new direction after years of going to the principle office soberness. Finally, the recognition a sweeping overhaul was needed. After a long wait, I feel vindicated.
Tricia Tuttle takes charge of the film festival this spring from outgoing head Carlo Chatrian. The American born fest organiser ran the BFI London Film Festival.
This begs the question, why did the Berlinale have two heads? At the 2019 announcement, the team had the chemistry of a vegan touring a McDonald’s Burger Patty factory. In Carlo and Mariette’s defence, the two inherited a film festival in steep decline, with a resistant to change thin skinned staff structure, then the Covid Pandemic hit, not ideal situations for even the most seasoned leaders. Carlo headed the creative side, his cinema views veered more toward art house, shunning the glamour, while Mariette, a Berlin insider, would handle the admin tasks. Rissenbeek jumped in March 2023. The behind the scenes drama of the Berlinale have overshadowed the festival itself.
After budget cut announcements, fewer films, the writing was on the wall. Chatrian’s resignation, or should we say, “knifed in the stomach”, triggered a petition signing from global filmmakers lead by Martin Scorsese requesting a reversal of his decision to leave.
As a former attendee, I was to be placed me on a “no go” list for my, now proven right, 2019 Berlinale critiques. I thought major change was warranted at the February film affair. This was a festival basking in its own high-minded pretensions, yet had fallen behind both bigger and smaller cinema gatherings. The size of the festival emphasised quantity, screening up or over 300 or more films in different sections, at the expense of quality.
Berlin has never been a service friendly city. The city has been called “A service desert”. The festival lives up to this reputation. In comparison to other festivals, cinema curating was never a strong point in the German Capital. Forget about asking the Berlinale coordinators about the films showing, they were too busy telling everyone how busy they were. The way to learn if a good film was unspooling: 1. Fest gossip 2. Insider trading 3. A compass.
Tricia could be a much needed shot in the arm for the Berlinale. The powers in Germany decided on her because they want a festival on par with Cannes and Venice. Tuttle has a more commercial sense regarding cinema and certainly with a loaded rolodex of names to the creative world. Her approach will be different than the past on how to organize a cinema gathering, perhaps leaner, more glitz. However, she will have to overcome organisational challenges in trying to revive the fortunes of an increasing less relevant film festival.
The saying “Hope is the last thing ever lost.”
The 74th edition of the BERLINALE starts February 15th, 2024.
Jean Paul Gaultier again arrives in Berlin to creatively head Falling In Love musical show at Friedrichstadt-Palast Berlin.
Here is a sneak peek from the show.
The 73rd Berlinale European Shooting Stars Awards were presented at a festive gala on 20th February, 2023. The evening awards recognizing new talent were moderated by journalist Nadine Kreutzer. During the weekend before the event, the ten Shooting Stars nominees participated in promotional interviews. Black and Paper talked to three of them.
Judith State from Romania had classical ballet training and is now a professional actress, choreographer and dancer. She says, “I always see myself first and foremost as a dancer.” In 2016, State made her screen debut in Cristi Puiu’s Sieranevada. She considered her involvement in the film as a “beautiful accident”. After premiering in Cannes, she was also nominated for a Romanian Gopo Award for Best Supporting Actress. She adds, “Ever since that moment I have been involved and have been lucky to now combine my careers in dance and film.”
State received a Gopo Award for Best Actress in Marius Olteanu’s 2018 debut film Monsters, and Cristi Puiu’s Manor House in 2020. Both films premiered at the Berlinale and Cristi Puiu also won the Encounters Award for Best Director. In 2020, State also starred in Daniel Sandu’s The Father Who Moves Mountains and Liviu Marghidan’s Refuge. The dance film Zenith, by Hungarian director Gyuri Kristoff, followed in 2021. In 2022 she played the lead role in Cristian Mungiu’s R.M.N., which premiered in Cannes. Otherwise, State doesn’t feel Romania appreciates home grown films despite international awards, adding “It is quite painful!”
Gizem Erdogan’s Turkish parents moved to Sweden in the 1970s, where she was later born. She studied at the Conservatory in Sweden then did a couple of years on stage. In 2014 she got the part in her debut feature film Dream On. For the film, Erdogan was nominated for Best Supporting Actress at the Guldbaggen Swedish Academy Awards. In 2020 the TV series Caliphate made her a national star. She has since won three Best Actress awards and says, “Caliphate was a breakthrough role for me.”
This is Erdogan’s first participation at the Berlinale. However, she confessed, “I had been dreaming about Shooting Stars since I went to drama school.” She also admitted that it is a busy schedule for the participants. Erdogan added, “I hope Shooting Stars will give me the opportunity to do international co-productions.” One such co-production is scheduled soon, but is something she can’t talk about at the moment.
Thorvaldur Kristjansson started out in the theatre, admitting there were initially less opportunities in film. His first film role was Black’s Game in 2017, earning him a nomination for Best Actor at the Eddan Icelandic Film and TV Awards. In 2020 Kristjansson won Best Supporting Actor for The Minister, a TV Series. Roles followed in the locally popular films I Remember You and Life in a Fishbowl. He then provided voice-over for the 2021 animated short Yes-People, the film receiving an Oscar nomination. In his latest film, A Letter from Helga, he adapted the Lee Strasberg method acting style. The film topped the Icelandic box office in 2022.
Last year Iceland had four films at the Berlinale but nothing this year. Kristjansson explains, “We are a growing industry but it’s such a small market, funded by the government.” However, he is happy they are now making independent productions, hence more variety. Currently based in Stockholm, Kristjansson is focusing on his film and TV work. He says, “I am afraid of going back to the theatre, to be honest. It is a muscle that you have to exercise.” However, with film, he adds, “You have to be in a perfect mode of focus. You need to go out and then go in (again).”
Meanwhile, at the Berlinale, Finnish stage, TV, and film actor Alina Tomnikov won the European Shooting Stars Award for 2023. Her current film is the comedy drama The Worst Idea Ever.
By Steven Yates
After the announcements of the main awards of this year’s Berlinale, other films also deserve recognition. In the Encounters section, The Klezmer Project was directed by Leandro Koch and Paloma Schachmann. Although it did not win (Here, by Bas Devos, took the prize), The duo’s work deserves stand-alone appraisal. Leandro, a frustrated Jewish wedding cameraman in Argentina meets and falls in love with a clarinetist. To spend time with her he contrives a documentary project commission for television. This project will take him across the remotest parts of Eastern Europe.
The Klezmer Project is original in that it adds a linear fictional narrative onto what is otherwise a documentary. It also manages to do this very seamlessly to provide double interest and entertainment. The quest to find the lost klezmer melodies that have been safeguarded by the Romani people both educates and fascinates. The film was recognized by winning the GWFF society Best First Feature Award. The prize of 50,000 € guarantees the safeguarding of Film and TV rights. A Special Mention from the GWFF was also given to The Bride, directed by Myriam U. Birara and in the Forum Competition section.
Tótem, directed by Lila Aviles, played in the Competition section failed to win any of the main awards. However, this Spanish take on melodrama both charmed and delighted. A family celebrates the birthday of a young father, also a painter. Sadly, he is also facing his impending mortality. The child protagonist, played by newcomer Naíma Senties, could easily have won the Silver Bear for Best Leading Performance. The award went to another child protagonist Sofía Otero for 20,000 Species of Bees. Tótem, however, won the prize of the Ecumenical Jury. The well received work finished ahead of Golden Bear winner On the Adamant, awarded Special Mention at the festival.
One film in the Competition which surprisingly failed to win a prize was Limbo, directed by Ivan Sen. A detective called Travis Hurley arrives in a small Australian outback town. Staying at the Hotel Limbo, he has come to investigate a 20-year-old unsolved homicide of an Aboriginal woman. The only evidence he has is a number of tape recordings. Meanwhile, the victim’s family is reluctant to give much information, particularly to a white cop.
With patience, Travis will uncover some unpleasant truths, highlighting the injustice faced by Aboriginal Australians. Indigenous Australian film director Ivan Sen had previously won the Premiere First Movie Award at the Berlinale in 2002 for his first film Beneath Clouds. In Limbo he has created a hypnotic “desert noir” that makes excellent use of the landscapes. The choice of black and white further enhances the backdrop and static progress of narrative resolution.
A personal nod also goes to the following films: Blackberry, The Shadowless Tower (Main Competition); Boom! Boom! The World vs. Boris Becker, Kiss the Future (Berlinale Special – Out of Competition); Calls from Moscow, Notes from Eremocene, Cidade Rabat (Forum Section).
By Steve Yates
The 73rd Berlinale: A Look at the Main Prize Winners
The Berlin International Film Festival 2023 Award Ceremony took place on 25th February. Actress Kristen Stewart served as president of a seven-person international jury. The prize ceremony has often had some unusual choices for winners and this year was no exception.
The Golden Bear for Best Film went to On the Adamant, directed by Nicolas Philibert. As always, it is the film‘s producers (here, Céline Loiseau, Gilles Sacuto and Miléna Poylo) who are credited for the prize. The documentary focuses on a day care center on the River Seine in Paris. During the course of the film we get to know the bond between the care workers and patients
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Christian Petzold has always been a popular director at the Berlinale. This year he won the Silver Bear Grand Jury Prize for Red Sky (Afire). Four young people are staying in a holiday home on the Baltic Coast. One of them is a writer, struggling to finish his latest book. Meanwhile there are warnings of a heat wave and potential forest fire nearby. Petzold is successful here in making character interactions become a study in existential psychology. Also notable is the building of tension in what is otherwise a slow-paced but compelling film.
The Silver Bear Jury Prize was awarded to the Portuguese film Bad Living, directed by João Canijo. It concerns five women who have run an old hotel with ongoing conflicts. When a younger person arrives, old wounds are reopened.
Philippe Garrel, the French director (and sometime actor), is popular at the Berlinale and beyond, with films also regularly featuring in competition at Cannes and Venice. This year The Plough won him the Silver Bear for Best Director. The film concerns a traveling family puppet theater. After the father and grandmother die, the remaining family struggles to keep the legacy alive. It deserved the award for depicting the passion and realities of a puppet theater in the modern age.
Other main awards benefitted from the renowned Berlin accolades for fringe or special interest topics. Sofía Otero was awarded the Silver Bear for Best Leading Performance in 20,000 Species of Bees. Directed by Estibaliz Urresola Solaguren, a distraught child and her mother experience life changing experiences in a summer house. At just eight-years-old, Otero has made history as the youngest Berlinale winner.
Thea Ehre won the Silver Bear for Best Supporting Performance in Till the End of the Night by Christoph Hochhäusler. In the crime thriller, Ehre plays a Trans character just out of prison on probation. Meanwhile, Angela Schanelec received the Silver Bear for Best Screenplay for Music, a perplexing film that will likely divide audiences. Concerning the Oedipus myth and containing little dialogue, its accolade therefore seems somewhat controversial.
Finally, the Silver Bear for Outstanding Artistic Contribution was awarded to Hélène Louvart for her cinematography in Giacomo Abbruzzese’s Disco Boy. A film not without some flaws, the prize for original cinematography was nonetheless well deserved.
By Steven Yates