Tag: 72nd Berlinale

The weakest Berlinale I’ve ever attended announces its winners…

Posted on by Redmond Bacon

Trust my luck: despite having seen 15 of the 18 entries in the Berlin Film Festival competition, I missed Alcarràs, Carla Simón’s second feature and the Golden Bear winner. Congratulations to her, although I cannot possibly pass judgement on the victory considering I have not seen the film. Having also missed Synonyms (Nadav Lapiud) in 2019, Touch me Not (Adina Pintilie) in 2018, Body or Soul (Ildiko Enyedi) in 2017 and Fire at Sea (Gianfranco Rosi) in 2016, I am obviously cursed.

Perhaps Alcarràs is a masterpiece, but the buzz around it didn’t suggest an unequivocal five-star film. In fact, throughout my entire foray through the Competition, there was only one film that will stay with me forever: Ulrich Seidl’s Rimini, a fantastic, multifaceted, debate-provoking work that naturally went home without a single award. I thought it might at least win best performance for Michael Thomas, who remains constantly compelling and larger-than-life throughout. But he lost to a worthy winner, the fantastic Meltem Kaptan, who simply transforms Andreas Dresen’s Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George W. Bush (pictured below) through sheer force of personality alone.

Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George W. Bush

It’s a strange year when, despite severe dialect differences between North Tyrol and Bremen, the two best competition entries are in the German language. Carlo Chatrian, in his third year as the artistic director, and generally doing a good job shaking the Festival up while sticking to its experimental roots, promised less politics and more love stories this year.

Despite this, the politically-minded tales were invariably more interesting than the preponderance of middling to bad French and Franco-German romances — films like Claire Denis’ Both Sides of the Blade, Nicolette Krebitz’s A E I O U – A Quick Alphabet of Love and François Ozon’s Peter Von Kant (pictured at the top of this article) -that dominated the competition this year. Occasionally, these safe middle-European choices resulted in Mikhaël Hers’s lovely Passengers of the Night (no awards, pictured below), but most of these picks would have felt more comfortable for the less provocative Special Gala section.

Further afield, francophiles worldwide have had a field day, considering that Rithy Panh’s Everything Will Be Ok (the rare entirely political film that fell apart in its ponderous narration), Ursula Meier’s The Line (feature image) and Denis Côté’s That Kind of Summer were also in French while being from Cambodia, Switzerland and Quebec respectively. Honestly, what’s left for Cannes?

Passengers of the Night

Along with an overall ARTE-sanctioned, EU-friendly aesthetic, whiteness, middle-age and heterosexuality was the name of the game: over and over again. I’m not usually the one to care too much about film festivals being diverse just for the sake of it, but I felt the lack of worldwide perspectives here in favour of a particularly played-out white, straight sexuality. Films that tried to do something a bit different like Isaki Lacuesta’s One Year, One Night, looking at the after-effects of the Bataclan attacks, barely interrogated the current political situation in Europe, aiming instead at pop-psychology and banal romantic drama.

In this respect, Rimini, which actively confronted the ugliness at the heart of the continent, or Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George W. Bush, which forthrightly criticised the issues of American imperialism across the world and how that can even be felt in Europe, felt far more honest, and heartfelt.

The few Asian exceptions, like Indonesia’s Before, Now & Then (Kamila Andini), China’s Return to Dust (Li Ruijun) and Korea’s The Novelist’s Film (Hong Sangsoo, pictured below) were often more psychologically fascinating and aesthetically innovative than their European counterparts, but I can’t claim to even truly love those films either. Then from North and Central America was Natalia López Gallard’s indecipherable Robe of Gems and Phyllis Nagy’s Call Jane (which I missed), neither of which dominated critical conversation at the festival. Eastern Europe, Central Asia, South America, Africa and Australasia were completely absent.

It’s sad to say, considering how much I love the Berlinale, and how I actually consider myself to be rather generous, but this year was probably the worst I’ve attended. Perhaps the pandemic has made it difficult, perhaps the Franco-German alliance is a little too strong, perhaps I am particularly cynical this time round, but the festival might do well to ditch the love stories next year. Failing that, maybe they can just find better ones instead.

Hong Sangsoo

Full List of Awards:

Golden Bear

Alcarràs (Carla Simón)

Silver Bear: Grand Jury Prize

The Novelist’s Film (Hong Sang-soo)

Silver Bear: Jury Prize

Robe of Gems (Natalia Lopez Gallardo)

Silver Bear for Best Director

Claire Denis (Both Sides of the Blade)

Silver Bear for Best Leading Performance

Meltem Kaptan (Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George W. Bush)

Silver Bear for Best Supporting Performance

Laura Basuki (Before, Now & Then)

Silver Bear for Best Screenplay

Laila Stieler (Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George W. Bush)

Silver Bear for Outstanding Artistic Contribution

Rithy Panh (Everything Will Be Ok)

Silver Bear: Special Mention

A Piece of Sky (Michael Koch)

A E I O U – A Quick Alphabet of Love (A E I O U – Das schnelle Alphabet der Liebe)

Posted on by Redmond Bacon

QUICK SNAP: LIVE FROM BERLIN!

A stands for Anna (Sophie Rois) and Adrian (Milan Herms).

E stands for Elocution: troubled teen Adrian has a problem with pronunciation, so it’s up to the past-it, middle-aged actress Anna to teach him how to project his words on stage for his high school play.

I stands for Inhibitions: while working together, they slowly lose them, resulting in a delirious, oddball romance.

O stands for “Oh My God”: words I uttered regularly as the film constantly engaged in cringe-worthy storytelling techniques.

And U stands for Udo Kier: Anna’s landlord and confidant who provided the biggest laughs simply by looking and reacting at things. He’s a great screen presence, but was mostly underused.

This is a quick alphabet of love, with only the vowels needed. It makes sense when you think about it: with one fricative notwithstanding, they are the vowels most commonly used while in the throes of love-making. But this is a talky, playful film, filled with consonants too, as the young boy and the older woman slowly navigate their sort-of inappropriate romance, taking them from the streets of Berlin to the beaches of southern France. At once enjoyable, pleasant and easy-going, as well as occasionally dipping into unearned, hands-over-eyes sentimentality, Alphabet of Love, or Licorice Flammkuchen, is unlikely to set the world on fire, but still is an interesting take on spring-autumn romance.

Y isn’t a German vowel, and it isn’t much of a question in the film either, which starts off as a conventional navigation of social mores before moving into pure fantasy territory, finally dipping into one of the most amiable of genres: the Cote D’Azur criminal con-man genre; glittering hotels and casinos galore. Director Nicolette Krebitz starts by the idyllic Mediterranean, Anna looking at a police-line up of five guys, each holding up one of the five German syllables. Adrian is in the line-up but Anna is giving nothing away, before the film cuts back to how they first meet, the young lad mugging her outside of Paris Bar, Berlin.

He’s a troubled child — although a psychologically vacuous one — and she’s an intemperate former star, once a marquee name but now forced to work as a speech therapist. Adrian comes from a foster family, with his odds stacked against him from the beginning, whereas Anna once had it all but suffered the same fate many women do once they go past a certain age. It makes for an interesting coupling, but the conversations and actions are more focused on quirky details — like where Anna hides her cigarettes, or Adrian’s pickpocketing skills — than bringing this conflict into view. I can’t say that I minded, with the film often working best in its final, more fantastical sequences than during the staid, clichéd parts earlier on. Ending on the use of one of my all-time favourite songs, this is the kind of love story that won’t change your life, but makes for a fun date night watch. Just don’t take your mother.

A E I O U – A Quick Alphabet of Love plays in competition at Berlin Film Festival, running from 10-20th February.

Both Sides of the Blade (Avec Amour et Acharnement)

Posted on by Redmond Bacon

To borrow the same metaphor, Both Sides of the Blade is a double-edged sword. On the one hand we have a finely-acted drama minutely detailing the ins and outs of marriage and infidelity; on the other, we have an overwrought and sentimental tale that doesn’t ever compel the audience to sit up in its seat the way the average Claire Denis film usually does. This is a half-baked, disappointing effort from one of our great living directors, all the more of a letdown due to her normally high batting average.

The radiant Juliette Binoche, returning with Denis after Let the Sunshine In (2017),stars as Sara, a woman seemingly secure in her relationship with Jean (Vincent Lindon). The film opens on an idyllic scene, the middle-aged couple swimming in the sea, cuddling and kissing before returning to their Paris apartment and making love. But the music, courtesy of Tindersticks, suggests an erotic thriller; a mash of discordant trumpets and strings portending confusion ahead. For Jean has entered into business with Sara’s former flame François (Grégoire Colin), alighting a moody marital drama that never settles on a consistent and engaging tone.

Denis is known for her highly stylish approach to filmmaking, even when making a so-called “domestic drama”: from Sara’s first sighting of François to a frantic agency opening to the endless arguments with her husband, the camera gets inside her head and creates an appropriate sense of disorientation, further complimented by Denis’ mixture of camera formats. From moment to moment, the dialogue is smart: while on the nose throughout, it allows the couple to test each other, as they debate what François means to them and how he will dominate their lives.

Binoche typically excels in the main role, portraying a woman who knows what she wants, but is afraid of what happens if she gets it. She’s both smart and cunning, sexy and brave, afraid and manipulative, often within the same scene. Even when the story falls short, she finds new dimensions to her character throughout. Lindon rises equally to the game, moving between magnanimity and jealousy, pragmatism and anger, with ease. Together, they keep the lockdown-light drama engaging — with reminders of the coronavirus pandemic throughout and endless scenes shot within their modern Rue D’Amsterdam apartment — throughout each scene despite the failure of the plot, co-written with novelist Christine Angot, to give them any shape to their respective destinies.

But what of François, occupying the Count Vronsky-role in this modern-day Anna Karenina? Wearing a Le Coq Sportif jacket and riding a motorcycle, he’s criminally underwritten; giving us little sense of why he’s such a big deal. Other supporting players, including Jean’s black son and white mother, or a friendly pharmacist, are equally tokenistic, making me feel that the film would be better without them taking part at all. The whole thing is filled with unearned moments, even if the individual craft is fairly sturdy. While by the end you can see from both sides (of the blade) now, it’s that crucial third side that needs further sharpening. Or even better, a much sharper knife.

Both Sides of the Blade played in Competition at the Berlin Film Festival, running from February 10th to the 20th. On all major VoD platforms in December.

Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George W. Bush (Rabiye Kurnaz gegen George W. Bush)

Posted on by Redmond Bacon

QUICK SNAP: LIVE FROM BERLIN!

Being both highly important and deeply funny at the same time without one part overshadowing the other is a difficult line to tread, but Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George W. Bush, stemming from a fantastic central performance by Meltem Kaptan, manages to feel absolutely effortless. The kind of crowd-pleasing comedy that you could probably recommend to just about anybody, expect it to be a domestic hit in Germany and perhaps even have many admirers overseas.

The year is 2001. The US is in paranoiac overdrive due to the recent 9/11 bombings. Turkish-German Murat (Abdullah Emre Öztürk) travels to Pakistan from Bremen without telling his mother Rabiye (Meltem Kaptan). He is later arrested by the authorities on suspicion of terrorism and later taken to Guantanamo Bay. As he is not technically being held on American soil, he is denied the right to a fair trial, leading Rabiye to enlist the services of German human rights lawyer Bernhard Docke (Alexander Scheer).

It is at once a courtroom drama and a culture-clash comedy, with the chaotic Turkish mother and the stereotypically rigid German lawyer butting heads on the proper way to do things. For example, while he insists that things takes time, Rabiye likes to rush into rooms, demanding the nearest minister’s attention. But where a lesser screenplay might have let this play out in obvious, cringe-worthy ways, Rabiye Kurnaz has laser-sharp focus on both its central characters, making their relationship feel natural and well-earned despite their many differences. It’s a huge step up from the other war on terror comedy Curveball (Johannes Naber, 2020), which lacked both urgency or even a single laugh.

Taking place over many years, the film does a great job of explaining the different levels of bureaucratic hell that Murat is under without ever having feeling complex or over-explained. New developments that could’ve become repetitive or over-laboured are placed in new settings each time, managing to reveal something new about the characters in the process. Kaptan, with her larger-than-life demeanour, huge bird’s-nest haircut and motor-mouth attitude, is the absolute centre of the piece. Rarely falling into cliché, she elevates the script into the kind of well-made broad comedy (with a message) that contemporary cinema so often lacks.

The facts of the case are shocking: not only are 39 people still held in Cuba without ever having a fair trial, but the German government has been proven to actively cover up their involvement in the so-called war of terror. It’s a bitter pill to swallow, making a comedy such as this a better delivery system for the film’s message than any dark and depressing camp-set drama ever could. In fact comedy is perfect, because it humanises Muslim people instead of constantly seeing them through a victim/perpetrator binary, actually working better than nearly all of the 00s war on terror thrillers to discuss the legacy of American overreach.

It also provides a key lesson to the new wave of unfunny American “serious” comedies, from Don’t Look Up (Adam McKay, 2021) to Bombshell (Jay Roach, 2019). You don’t need to lecture in order to get your message across. You simply have to be funny. Rabiye Kurnaz is all of that and more.

Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George W. Bush plays in Competition at the 72nd Berlinale, running between February 10th and 20th.

Before, Now & Then (Nana)

Posted on by Redmond Bacon

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A once stylish yet reserved, opulent yet modest, Before Now & Then creates a reflective portrait of a country in turmoil through the romantic experiences of one women. More of a contemplative character portrait than a traditional romance, it offers rewards in its resplendent filmmaking while smartly examining the nuances of the feminine experience.

Nana (Happy Salma) has a comfortable life. She lives on a large Dutch colonial estate alongside her husband Mr Darga (Arswendy Bening Swara) and children, hosting gatherings of women where they listen to music, eat food and talk about family. But her dreams suggest otherwise, reminding Nana of her violent past escaping the coups and genocides that characterised 60s Indonesia. Having lost her first husband and child in the coup, she remembers the war in vivid detail, unable to move forward in a country that’s on the cusp of rapid change.

The role of women in this patriarchal society seems yet to be defined. While men are free to go and do as they want, as seen through Mr Darga’s dalliances with other women, Nana gathers the small pleasures while she can, like smoking a cigarette on the terrace or playing with her children. At the meat market she meets the mysterious Ino (Laura Basuki) — with a kind smile, she simply radiates empathy, allowing Nana to figure out how to navigate this new reality.

It’s not only Nana who seems stuck between past and present; the film itself has little concern with traditional narratives, instead giving us a full sense of who Nana is. A lot of the time, we simply watch her thinking, captured against the gorgeousness of her house and almost always impeccably dressed. Her daughter asks her why women’s hair has be kept up: the answer is “to keep secrets”, the likes of which are slowly revealed to us piecemeal throughout this carefully crafted story.

A great sense of romanticism and unspoken longing comes through the music, mixing contemporary 60s songs, traditional and a lush score that moves between waltzes and playful string movements. The music, bringing to mind In The Mood for Love (Wong Kar Wai, 2000), is almost constant throughout the film, almost acting against the slowness and consideration of the characters themselves. Credit must go to Salma herself, able to command the camera and allow us to see her perspective even when it seems like she’s not doing much at all.

It’s likely that many of the cultural and feminine nuances of the story eluded me — it’s not particularly illuminating for anyone learning about mid-twentieth century Indonesian history for the first time — yet once I settled into its rhythms, I found it to be a fine, absorbing aesthetic experience, even if I was never fully enraptured by its style.

Before, Now & Then plays in Competition at the 72nd Berlin Film Festival, running from February 10th to 20th.

The Line (La Ligne)

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The distance between mother and daughter is represented quite literally in The Line, with a 100 metre painted border separating Margaret (Stéphanie Blanchoud) from her mother Cristina (Valeria Bruni Tedeschi). The line, created by her younger sister Marion (Elli Spagnolo), is a last-ditch resort to stop the perennially angry Margaret from hurting her mother again.

It’s a film that starts in exaggerated fury, women chasing each other across a room in slow-motion to opera music. It doesn’t matter what set Margaret off: everything sets her off, with physical violence her first resort when she feels she can’t win an argument. She is given a restraining order. She repeatedly ignores it. Hence the line, both physical necessity and apt metaphor.

While the premise might seem absurd, it never stretches the bounds of plausibility. This is because, to paraphrase Tolstoy, every family is absurd in its own way. Ursula Meier’s Swiss-French drama is highly attuned to the neuroses and internal logic every family abides by in order to survive, crafting a touching exploration of mother-daughter relationships and the difficulty of seeing eye-to-eye.

The focal point is Marion. She might be the youngest in the family, but she possesses a steely resolve, aided by God, that makes her the ultimate go-between, standing on the line outside their house like a friendly border guard. Untouched by the neuroses that make up adult life, including Christina’s melodramatic, selfish nature, Margaret’s stress and their other sister Louise’s (India Hair) bad brokering skills, Marion has the kind of conviction only afforded by youth. Credit must go to Spagnolo, who holds her nerve excellently against veteran actors.

Using music as a through-line, whether it’s ex-concert pianist Cristina’s impending deafness, Margaret’s guitar skills or Marion’s choir-practice, the family bound together by both deafening highs and almighty lows, all in search of some kind of settled harmony. While the cinematography by regular Denis-collaborator Agnes Godard is mostly unshowy, the clean blocking and the occasional flourish help to elevate the material from being a mere actor’s showcase. So do the fine Swiss locations, adding mountain grandeur and rustic charm to the kind of story that could be set anywhere in the world.

But great music lingers not only in their harmonies and melodies, but also their cadences. The Line fails to wrap up its music and distance metaphor in a satisfying way; cross-cutting between different events and ending on a cliff-hanger just when they should finding a neat way to converge. Cliffhangers work best when you can resolve the chord yourself, but this diminished ending left me wanting a more satisfying and pleasing conclusion.

With that said, family isn’t a battle, it’s a war. Once the lines are drawn, it’s hard to put them away again. The Line shows this conflict in all its messy glory.

The Line just premiered in competition at the 72nd Berlin International Film Festival, running from 10-20th February!

Robe of Gems (Manto de Gema)

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The limits of good intentions are sorely tested in Robe of Gems, a moody crime-and-family drama simply too inscrutable for its own good. Despite boasting assured mise-en-scène, fine naturalist performances and a sense of lingering dread, it had me constantly asking all the wrong questions, namely: who, what, when and how?

The where is easy. This is rural Mexico, a place where crime appears to be rife and even the local police are in on the take. Gangsters boast of the ease with which they can buy guns from a show in the USA, disassemble them and then legally transport the parts across the border. The middle-class Isabel (Nailea Norvind) returns to her mother’s villa, where they learn that their long-time domestic servant María’s (Antonia Olivares) sister has gone missing. Isabel, despite warnings to the contrary, goes on a quixotic quest to get to the bottom of this drama, her story intersecting with a policewoman’s son (Juan Daniel Garcia Treviño) working for the local cartel.

This is Natalia López Gallardo’s first feature, having previously worked as an editor on the films of Amat Escalante, Lisandro Alonso and Carlos Reygadas. There is a touch of Reygadas to the start of the film featuring a long take of the sunrise that brings to mind Silent Night (2007). And despite the real-life relevance of the story — considering a shocking 100,000 people are currently missing in Mexico – she takes a similarly slow and atmospheric approach throughout the entire film.

On a purely formal level, it’s very well-made and contemplative: whether it’s shooting at the twilight hour, delving into dream sequences, making use of epic floating takes or turning up the sound of insects to an almost unbearable degree. But it doesn’t proceed story-wise with dream logic, allowing us to find poetic connections between characters, but with a kind of 4D chess approach — making it hard to know who is who, why they are acting in certain ways or why we should care. This approach is most effective when these women brush up against the banality of evil found in the local crime scene, but I don’t know why the film itself had to be so banal at the same time.

In the right hands, this kind of angular drama can be effective, such as Ridley Scott’s The Counsellor (2013), which had a similar sense of tragic inevitability while also needing a roadmap to sort things out. But on top of becoming confused, I was also annoyed: the film more interested in piling moments together than ever throwing in a few clues to help us along. Additionally, the camera often shoots scenes where we only see one character’s face while the other is talking, or with no one’s face at all; simply lingering on the tools they use at work or eating at the family table. While in a drama with a couple of players, this approach makes sense, it proves fatal in an ensemble piece.

By the end, I had one final question to ask myself: why? I definitely can’t answer that one.

Robe of Gems just premiered in competition at the 72nd Berlin International Film Festival, running from 10-20th February!

Peter von Kant

Posted on by Redmond Bacon

Every remake has one central question to ask: why does this film actually have to be made? The answer eluded me throughout Peter von Kant, François Ozon’s tepid French-language remake of Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s classic 1972 film The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant. The genders may be flipped, but it captures little spirit of the original while treading no new ground.

The year is the same, 1972, but the action has moved from Bremen to Cologne. Peter von Kant (Denis Ménochet) is now a filmmaker. In remaking Fassbinder, Ozon essentially recasts von Kant as a version of the great German himself, with Ménochet attempting to replicate his large posture, towering gait and menacing bursts of anger while snorting Scarface-levels of cocaine. He is constantly awaited on by the silent Karl (Stéfan Crépon), a weedy assistant with a handlebar moustache. Suffering from a break-up, the petulant filmmaker is granted a new lease on life by the arrival of Amir (Khalil Gharbia) — both beautiful yet vulnerable, he falls quickly into his hands. But love and art are a dangerous mix, with von Kant’s manipulations quickly descending into petty neediness.

“Great filmmaker, human shit,” quips von Kant’s friend Sidonie (Isabelle Adjani), a remark that could be applied to Fassbinder himself, who completed 40 films before his death by overdose at 37. But anyone expecting any new insights into the mighty, taboo-busting filmmaker will be disappointed, Ménochet aiming for dark drama but landing on broad soap opera instead. The supporting actors aren’t particularly interesting either; in fact, it really does just feel like they’re going though the lines.

Talking of the actual words in this “adaptation”, it’s quite remarkable just how rigid it is. Even banal lines such as the proffering of coffee or the booking of flights are kept almost exactly the same; making me wonder why this was staged as a film rather than as a play. And while the set is well-designed — from the film posters on the wall to the beautiful models-blown up Helmut Newton style — and the costumes are typically brilliant from the filmmaker of 8 Women (2002), that same sense of lived-in sadness that characterised Petra’s apartment is sorely missing.

That space was navigated in Petra von Kant with some of the best blocking committed to film, especially within just a single space. And while it would be fruitless for Ozon to replicate the impeccable cinematography from Michael Ballhaus in the original, it would’ve at least been effective for the film to at least give us a similar sense of space. Instead, Ozon prefers conventional filmmaking techniques, such as cross-cutting conversations and inserting reaction shots instead of the languid, moody filmmaking of the former. It undercuts the effectiveness of the adaptation massively — instead of deeply mannered high German drama, we get a micro-dose of French farce that actually feels more artificial than the notoriously stagy Fassbinder while retaining none of the same dark emotion.

Fassbinder looms large over the German filmmaking psyche, a filmmaker unafraid to tackle the norms of West German society through his depictions of sexuality, gender and race. As a result, it’s no surprise that Ozon’s doodle was chosen as the opening film. Not only is this a major step down from his previous Fassbinder adaptation, Water Drops on Burning Rocks (2000), but the ultimate tribute: in attempting to re-do Petra von Kant, he reminds viewers just why Fassbinder is such a revered filmmaker. It’s never just about the script; it’s how you adapt it that matters. The notes might sound the same, but the music is completely off-key.

Peter von Kant opened the competition of the 72nd Berlinale, when this piece was originally written. It premieres in the UK as part of the 66th BFI London Film Festival in October. In cinemas on Friday, December 30th. On an major Platforms on Monday, February 6th.

Bringing in the big hitters: a preview of this year’s Berlinale

Posted on by Redmond Bacon

If you judge a festival by the wider impact it had on the cinema scene, then last year’s bed-bound Berlinale seemed to break through its digital confines and become an unmitigated success. Radu Jude’s Bad Luck Banging, or Loony Porn (2021) had a fairly decent American release, Petite Maman (Céline Sciamma, 2021) was a petite, tear-provoking miracle, What Do We See When We Look at the Sky? (Alexandre Koberidze, 2021) became the unofficial film of Euro 2020, and I’m Your Man (Maria Schrader, 2021) was a rare cross-cultural German hit. It’s a reminder that good films are still good no matter how you watch them.

This year the organisers seem keen to repeat their success, so an all-star Berlinale competition team have arrived. There’s Denis Côté with That Kind of Summer, perhaps promising something substantial after his last few amusing trifles. There’s Claire Denis with Both Sides of The Blade (pictured above), probably poised for a hit by reuniting with Juliette Binoche. François Ozon is gender-flipping Fassbinder with Peter Von Kant. Ulrich Seidl is returning to Austria with Rimini. And Hong Sangsoo is, well, making a Hong Sang-soo film with The Novelist’s Film.

While Claire Denis is actually a newcomer, there’s a whole host of repeat offenders in the competition, with editor Natalia Lopez Gallardo the only debutant in competition with Robe of Gems. France is well-represented with seven films; Germany with four; and there’s an American entry in the 60s feminist drama Call Jane (Phyllis Nagy). Further afield, there’s Dark Glasses from Dario Argento in the Berlinale Special, Peter Strickland’s Flux Gourmet in Encounters, and Alain Guiraudie is opening Panorama with Nobody’s Hero.

With a coronavirus-prevention regime that the Chinese Olympic committee would appreciate — three vaccinations, full FFP2 masking, daily tests, no parties (at least, I got no invites), booking your tickets in advance, and 50% capacity screenings — the Berlinale is actually going beyond the requirements of the QR code-happy Berlin state to promise a truly virus-free Festival. If your phone dies, it’s basically game over, so I’m bringing two charger packs.

The time has probably passed to write something like “cinema is back” — it actually never went away, it just got smaller. But Germany’s biggest festival is brave to mount anything in-person at all, especially as Sundance and Rotterdam succumbed to Omicron-inspired digital editions. I’m hoping for cinematic excellence, a dozen negative tests and a return to the kind of buzz and vibe that only a physical festival can bring.

The Berlinale Film Festival runs from 10-20th February. Follow DMovies for all the coverage you need.