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Berlin International Film Festival · 2012

Berlin International Film Festival 2012

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69 films · 5 reviews

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12 Sisters (Puthisen Neang Kongrey)

Fairytale sees 12 beautiful sisters face trouble after they all marry a king.

(Country: Cambodia; Year: 1968; Director: Ly Bun Yim; Stars: Vireak Dara, Ly Patanak, Nop Nem, Saksi Sbong, Yeak Nhorm, Kim Nova)

349 (for Sol LeWitt)

“This digitally animated version of Sol LeWitt’s Wall Drawing #349 [...] careens through emblazoned emblems, lifted from walls and transported into dialogue with LeWitt’s exploration of spatial systems and human emotion.” Andréa Picard

(Country: Canada; Year: 2011; Director: Chris Kennedy; Writer: Chris Kennedy)

All Divided Selves

An unconventional, multiple-perspective documentary focused on the counter-culture psychiatrist RD Laing.

(Country: UK; Year: 2011; Director: Luke Fowler; Stars: RD Laing)

American Colour

A journey to the end of film? Shot on discontinued 16mm Kodachrome film stock, this travelogue traces a journey from the stock’s birthplace in Rochester, New York to Kansas, where a small photolab developed the last rolls in early 2011.

(Country: Canada / USA; Year: 2011; Director: Joshua Bonnetta)

As They say

A father and his son go to the mountain for a fishing weekend, the son makes a revelation which is going to change their lifes.

(Country: Morocco / United Arab Emirates; Year: 2011; Director: Hicham Ayouch)

At The Back/The Details

Avi Mograbi, assisted by a quartet around musician Noam Enbar, will fill the stage of HAU 2 with music and images. A film and an installation of Mograbi's will be remixed live, initiating a musical adaptation with guitar, keyboard, clarinet, and drums.

(Country: Israel; Year: 2012; Director: Avi Mograbi, Noam Enbar, Ariel Armoni, Adam Scheflan, Yoni Silver)

Austerity Measures

A colour-separation portrait of the Exarchia neighborhood of Athens.

(Country: Germany; Year: 2012; Director: Guillaume Cailleau, Ben Russell)

Avalon

Review preview for Avalon

Aspiring to character-study status, the film evades at almost every turn the more compelling moments of its bare-bones plot. It’s a shame.

Michael Pattison · 3 out of 5
When a nightclub owner accidentally kills a labourer, he finds himself with a dangerous debt.

(Country: Sweden; Year: 2011; Director: Axel Petersén; Writer: Axel Petersén; Stars: Johannes Brost, Peter Carlberg, Léonore Ekstrand)

Full review

Bestiaire

Review preview for Bestiaire

This is a challenging and rewarding piece that reflects your own thoughts as much as those of the filmmaker.

Amber Wilkinson · 4.5 out of 5
Documentary meditation on man's relationship with animals.

(Country: Canada, France; Year: 2012; Director: Denis Côté; Writer: Denis Côté)

Full review

Betty Drunk

In the new episode of Laure Prouvost's series “The Wanderer,” Betty constantly drinks herself out of all conventional framings.

(Country: UK; Year: 2011; Director: Laure Prouvost)

Between Yesterday and Tomorrow (Kino to ashita no aida)

A young man hands in his notice at work and breaks up with his girlfriend in order to pursue his true nature and dream of shaping the world according to his own desires.

(Country: Japan; Year: 1954; Director: Kawashima Yuzo; Stars: Tsuruta Koji, Tsukoka Yumeji, Awashima Chikage, Shindo Eitaro)

Beyond The Hill (Tepenin Ardi)

Faik, a proud old forester, is having trouble with nomads grazing their livestock on his land. For revenge, he and his hulking farm hand Mehmet snatch a goat to butcher for a family holiday, unwittingly sparking a dire blood feud.

(Country: Turkey / Greece; Year: 2012; Director: Emin Alper; Writer: Emin Alper; Stars: Tamer Levent, Reha Özcan, Mehmet Özgür)

Blames & Flames (Falgoosh)

The history of the Iranian revolution as the history of cinema.

(Country: Iran; Year: 2011; Director: Mohammadreza Farzad)

Brand X

Praised by Jonas Mekas in 1970 as “propaganda for the politics of joy and disorder”, painter and writer Wynn Chamberlain’s film is back to provide contemporary audiences with a strangely refreshing dose of late Sixties countercultural humour and political satire.

(Country: USA; Year: 1970; Director: Wynn Chamberlain; Stars: Taylor Mead, Sally Kirkland, Tally Brown, Frank Cavistani, Abby Hoffman)

Bye Bye

In revolutionary Cairo, the filmmaker tries to let go of objects accumulated over generations. He films inside the huge flat that used to belong to his parents, with an interior that dates back to the years preceding yet another revolution.

(Country: Egypt / Netherlands; Year: 2012; Director: Paul Geday)

Carlo's Vision

The film is based on Pasolini's novel Petrolio, a book cloaked in mystery, which Pasolini was working on until his death. Nashashibi translated one scene from it into contemporary Rome, bringing in questions on class and sexuality in modern-day Italy.

(Country: Italy; Year: 2011; Director: Rosalind Nashashibi)

Choked (Kashi)

A few years ago, Youn-ho's mother disappeared with the family’s money. He’s now trying to forge a new life with his girlfriend but more and more of his mother’s creditors keep knocking at the door.

(Country: Republic of Korea (South Korea); Year: 2011; Director: Kim Joong-hyun; Stars: Um Tae-goo, Park Se-jin, Kil Hae-Yeon, Yoon Chae-Young)

Condition (Die Lage)

In September 2011, Pope Benedict XVI visited Germany. If the press was to be believed, the whole country was gripped by Pope mania. The images Thomas Heise shows us of this visit don’t resemble in the slightest those seen for days on end on every channel.

(Country: Germany; Year: 2012; Director: Thomas Heise)

The condition of the working class in England - Little Ireland 1842 / 2011

This film is made in memory of Mary Burns, an illiterate worker who showed Engels the darker parts of Manchester. There, mostly Irish workers lived in dire conditions, which inspired Engels influential book The Condition of the Working Class in England.

(Country: UK; Year: 2011; Director: Rainer Ganahl)

Conference of the Birds

A hypnotist makes a film to illuminate the distance between himself and his beloved. Making the film takes as long as the lovers are separated. After the film’s completion, its maker is accused of intending to hypnotize the citizens and cause a rise up.

(Country: Iran / Germany / USA; Year: 2011; Director: Azin Feizabadi)

The Connection

A group of junkies improvise jazz as they wait for their heroin.

(Country: USA; Year: 1962; Director: Shirley Clarke; Writer: Jack Gelber; Stars: Warren Finnerty, Jerome Raphael, Garry Goodrow, Jim Anderson, Carl Lee, Barbara Winchester, Henry Proach, Roscoe Lee Browne, William Redfield, Freddie Redd, Jackie McLean)

The Delay (La demora)

An overworked and underpaid, a forty-something mother of three is driven to abandon her senile father so she can take better care of her children.

(Country: Uruguay, Mexico, France; Year: 2012; Director: Rodrigo Plá; Writer: Laura Santullo; Stars: Carlos Vallarino, Roxana Blanco)

Dragonflies With Birds And Snake (Trollsländor med Fåglar och Orm)

Not a scientific film, but rather a meditation, a contemplation on being itself.

(Country: Sweden / Germany; Year: 2011; Director: Wolfgang Lehmann)

The End Of Puberty (Koi ni itaru yamai)

Schoolgirl Tsubara is oddly obsessed with her awkward biology teacher Madoka but sparks fly after they have a sexual encounter.

(Country: Japan; Year: 2011; Director: Kimura Shoko; Stars: Wagatsuma Miwako, Saito Yoichiro, Satsukawa Aimi, Sometani Shota)

Espoir voyage

Years after his brother’s death, Burkinese filmmaker Michel Zongo sets out on a personal reconnaissance mission to the Ivory Coast.

(Country: France / Burkina; Year: 2011; Director: Michel K Zongo)

Everybody In Our Family (Toata lumea din familia noastra)

A divorcee who insists on taking his sick daughter on holiday finds the situation spinning rapidly out of control.

(Country: Romania / Netherlands; Year: 2012; Director: Radu Jude; Stars: Serban Pavlu, Sofia Nicolaescu, Mihaela Sîrbu)

Father, Mother, What Should I Film Today? (Vater, Mutter, was soll ich heute filmen?)

In six episodes, the daughter uses film to transpose the images that her parents requested.

(Country: Germany; Year: 2011; Director: Isabell Spengler)

For Ellen

Review preview for For Ellen

It took me a while to warm to this film...But as Yong Kim explores her characters a more nuanced, rewarding movie emerges.

Jeff Robson · 3.5 out of 5
A rock musician in the middle of an acrimonious divorce tries to gain access to his six-year-old daughter.

(Country: US; Year: 2012; Director: So Yong Kim; Writer: So Yong Kim; Stars: Paul Dano, Jon Heder, Jena Malone, Margarita Levieva, Shay Mandigo) , Official site

Full review

Formentera

Tensions rise for a couple on holiday after a woman disappears.

(Country: Germany; Year: 2012; Director: Ann-Kristin Reyels; Writer: Antonia Rothe, Katrin Milhahn, Ann-Kristin Reyels, Anke Stelling; Stars: Sabine Timoteo, Thure Lindhardt)

Francine

After serving time in prison, Francine settles down in small-town North America, trying to regain a foothold in society.

(Country: USA / Canada; Year: 2012; Director: Brian M. Cassidy, Melanie Shatzky; Writer: Brian M. Cassidy, Melanie Shatzky; Stars: Melissa Leo, Victoria Charkut, Keith Leonard)

Golden Slumbers (Le sommeil d'or)

Memorial to Cambodian cinema between 1960 to 75.

(Country: France / Cambodia; Year: 2011; Director: Davy Chou)

Harun Farocki presents: La Verifica Incerta

La Verifica Incerta (1965), by Baruchello and Grifi, is a seminal work of the montage film. Following the presentation of this little-known early work of the genre, Farocki will give a lecture examining its special methods of compiling found materials.

(Country: Germany / Italy; Year: 2012; Director: Harun Farocki)

Hemel

A father and daughter are more committed to one another than their string of on/off lovers... until the father falls for a young auctioneer.

(Country: Netherlands / Spain; Year: 2012; Director: Sacha Polak; Writer: Helena van der Meulen; Stars: Hannah Hoekstra, Hans Dagelet, Rifka Lodeizen)

Jaurès

Considerations of love as seen through the window of a flat.

(Country: France; Year: 2012; Director: Vincent Dieutre; Stars: Eva Truffaut, Vincent Dieutre)

Keep Me Upright (Tiens moi droite)

A scrapbook-like audiovisual diary of the director's search to find words to fit her symptoms and visual expression for her scoliosis (curvature of the spine).

(Country: France; Year: 2012; Director: Zoé Chantre; Writer: Zoé Chantre)

King Lost His Tooth

A subversive homage to the oeuvre of Brion Gysin, and his “cut-up” method consisting of the random assemblage of words cut out of a given paragraph.

(Country: Lebanon; Year: 2011; Director: Gheith Al-Amine)

Kid-Thing

Review preview for Kid-Thing

Kid-Thing is all about kid-think, with David Zellner keeping his main character's child perspective front and centre at all times.

Amber Wilkinson · 3.5 out of 5
A rebellious girl whose existence is devoid of parental guidance, hears a woman calling from a mysterious hole in the ground, asking for help.

(Country: US; Year: 2012; Director: David Zellner; Writer: David Zellner; Stars: Sydney Aguirre, Susan Tyrrell, Nathan Zellner, David Zellner)

Full review

The Last Days Of British Honduras

The film approaches on of the interlocking narrative threads of Ronald Tavel's 1971 play The Last Days of British Honduras, which is transposed from the jungles of Belize to the urban geography of wintertime Chicago.

(Country: UK; Year: 2011; Director: Catherine Sullivan, Farhad Sharmini)

The Last Friday (Al Juma Al Akheira)

Since gambling away everything he used to own, Yousef has lived alone in humble conditions, working as a taxi driver. In order to scrape together the money for an operation, he is forced to reconnect with his family.

(Country: Jordan / United Arab Emirates; Year: 2011; Director: Yahya Alabdallah; Stars: Ali Suliman, Fadi Arida, Yasmine Elmasri)

Lawinen der Erinnerung

Documentary film portrait.

(Country: Germany; Year: 2012; Director: Dominik Graf)

Living/Building (Habiter/Construire)

A French company is building a tarmac road in the desert of Chad. The film explores what this means for the local community.

(Country: France; Year: 2012; Director: Clémence Ancelin)

Modest Reception (Paziraie Sadeh)

A man and a woman are making their way through a war-torn mountainous region in an SUV. The boot of the car contains plastic bags filled with money to distribute to the needy people they encounter on their journey. But are the two of them really on a charitable mission?

(Country: Iran; Year: 2012; Director: Mani Haghighi; Stars: Taraneh Alidoosti, Mani Haghighi)

My father Is Still A Communist, Intimate Secrets To Be pPublished

All that is left of my parents’ relationship is a large number of audio-cassettes, sent as love letters during the time of civil war in Lebanon. When I was a child I created imaginative stories about my father as war hero fighting with the communists.

(Country: Lebanon; Year: 2011; Director: Ahmad Ghossein)

Negotiating Love (Beziehungsweisen)

Three couples in crisis each seek advice at therapy sessions and argue over infidelities, abortion and separate bedrooms.

(Country: Germany; Year: 2012; Director: Calle Overweg; Writer: Calle Overweg)

A Night Too Young (Prílis mladá noc)

Two adolescent boys, on the first day of the New Year, meet their school teacher and her two male friends, with emotional consequences.

(Country: Czech Republic, Slovenia; Year: 2012; Director: Olmo Omerzu; Writer: Bruno Hájek, Jakub Felcman, Olmo Omerzu; Stars: Martin Pechlát, Jirí Cerny, Natálie Rehorová, Vojtech Machuta, Jan Vasi)

Normal School (Escuela normal)

Documentary tracking student council elections at a school in Parana, Argentina.

(Country: Argentina; Year: 2012; Director: Celina Murga)

Ornette: Made in America

Clarke's final feature is a portrait of jazz legend Ornette Coleman.

(Country: USA; Year: 1985; Director: Shirley Clarke; Stars: William S. Burroughs, Ornette Coleman, Brion Gysin, Demon Marshall, Eugene Tatum)

Our Homeland (Kazoku no kuni)

Story of a Japanese emigre to Korea, who returns to his homeland after a 25-year absence.

(Country: Japan; Year: 2012; Director: Yang Yonghi; Stars: Iura Arata, Ando Sakura, Yang Ik-June)

Parabeton - Pier Luigi Nervi and Roman Concrete (Parabeton - Pier Luigi Nervi und römischer Beton)

Third in a series of architectural biographies, deals with modern concrete constructions.

(Country: Germany; Year: 2012; Director: Heinz Emigholz; Writer: Heinz Emigholz)

Peov Chouk Sor

Four carefree daughters of heaven come down to earth. Although the eldest warns of the dangers of picking human fruit, Peov Chouk Sor, the youngest of their number, is swayed by the sight of an attractive young peasant and promptly falls into misfortune.

(Country: Cambodia; Year: 1967; Director: Tea Lim Koun; Stars: Chea Yuthorn, Dy Saveth, Rosanna, Mongdolin)

Peril Of The Antilles

Haiti in 2010: the cholera epidemic was on its way to Port-au-Prince, a Hurricane was on the horizon, elections grew closer … then I acquired a very curious copy of Michel “Sweet Micky” Martelly’s (Haiti’s newest president) music video from his heyday.

(Country: USA / Haiti; Year: 2011; Director: Fern Silva)

The Red and the Black (La Rouge et la Noire)

A portrait of the famous inventor of movie cameras Jean-Pierre Beauviala and his firm Aaton.

(Country: France; Year: 2011; Director: Isabelle Prim)

Restricted Sensation (Draudziami Jausmai)

The story of a young Lithuanian, who, in the 1970s, loses his job at a theater because of accusations of homosexuality. Narkevičius recounts the events in a straightforward narrative, using first-hand accounts of Lithuanian gay men who lived under the threat of §122 of the Soviet Penal Code as the basis for his script.

(Country: Lithuania; Year: 2011; Director: Deimantas Narkevicius)

Revision

In 1992, two men were shot in a field near the German-Polish border. The circumstances which led to the death of Grigore Velcu and Eudache Calderar have not been clarified even today. Nearly 20 years later, Philip Scheffner carries out the painstaking investigation that never took place back then.

(Country: Germany; Year: 2012; Director: Philip Scheffner; Writer: Merle Kröger, Philip Scheffner)

Salsipuedes

A troubled couple’s camping trip is about to be punctuated by a visit from the woman's mother and sister.

(Country: Argentina; Year: 2012; Director: Mariano Luque; Writer: Mariano Luque; Stars: Mara Santucho, Marcelo Arbach, Mariana Briski)

Secret (Sekret)

Ksawery and Karolina are visiting Jan in the country. Ksawery is a dancer who performs as a drag queen and Karolina is his agent. Jan is Ksawery’s grandfather. Ksawery is gay, Karolina Jewish. Jan is guarding a dark secret from the time of the Holocaust. At first glance, an almost quintessential grouping for a story about history, a story about perpetrators and victims. But it’s not that simple. Identity here is composed of different layers that do not always harmonise according to background and allegiance. As such, Jan’s love for his grandfather is in conflict with his urge to find out what happened back then. The film draws on a suitably heterogeneous range of visual and narrative devices to express the disparate nature of the relationships between the three protagonists, and the different mosaic tiles from which their identities are formed: tenderness alongside violence, almost casual normality alongside extreme artificiality. Ksawery says at one point “I’m a corpse, I’m dead on the inside”. SEKRET taps into the seam of our identity that is passed on by preceding generations, a process that can hurt but also heal.

(Country: Poland; Year: 2012; Director: Przemyslaw Wojcieszek; Stars: Tomasz Tyndyk, Agnieszka Podsiadlik, Marek Kepinski)

Sleepless Knights

Carlos is spending the summer in the country with his family and, during his stay, he strikes up a relationship with a young policeman.

(Country: Germany; Year: 2012; Director: Stefan Butzmühlen, Cristina Diz; Stars: Raúl Godoy, Jaime Pedruelo)

The Snake Man (Puos Keng Kang)

After a woman mates with a snake, one of her offspring transforms into a man, who embarks on sexual intrigue of his own.

(Country: Cambodia; Year: 1970; Director: Tea Lim Koun; Stars: Chea Yuthorn, Dy Saveth, Peov Vicheth, Saksi Sbong, Mongdolin)

Soldier/Citizen (Bagrut Lochamim)

Towards the end of their military service, young Israelis are given another chance to obtain a school-leaving certificate if they don’t have it already. For three consecutive weeks, civic education is the order of the day. In uniform and with their guns always within reach, the students discuss pluralism, discrimination, human rights, the complex definition of the Jewish State and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.The camera soberly observes the heated debates, in which alarmingly intransigent views are expressed.

(Country: Israel; Year: 2012; Director: Silvina Landsmann)

Spain (Spanien)

A foreigner unintentionally stranded in Austria is trying everything to get to his original destination of Spain. A restorer who earns money on the side by painting religious icons has had enough of her ex-husband’s intrusions. He’s searching for the right words to get her back whilst sniffing around in the private lives of bi-national couples as part of his job as a police official. A gambling addict is hoping for assistance from a dubious finance institute. All of them are in search of happiness.

(Country: Austria; Year: 2012; Director: Anja Salomonowitz; Stars: Grégoire Colin, Tatjana Alexander, Cornelius Obonya, Lukas Miko)

The Sun In The Last Days Of The Shogunate (Bakumatsu taiyoden)

A brothel in the pleasure district of Shinagawa in 1862: young samurai Takasugi Shinasuku (Ishihara Yujiro) joins the fight to restore the imperial government and wants to drive foreigners out of the area. Meanwhile, the establishment’s two most beautiful geishas, Osome and Koharu, battle it out for the top spot, while the debt-plagued Osomo sees no alternative other than to stage a spectacular double suicide with a customer.

(Country: Japan; Year: 1957; Director: Kawashima Yuzo; Stars: Sakai Frankie, Hidari Sachiko, Minamida Yoko, Ishihara Yujiro)

Suzaki Paradise: Red Light (Suzaki Paradaisu Akashingo)

A penniless young couple Yoshigi (Mihashi Tatsuya) und Tsutue (Aratama Michiyo), in search of work, find employment near Tokyo's red light district... and discover it puts a strain on their relationship.

(Country: Japan; Year: 1956; Director: Kawashima Yuzo; Stars: Aratama Michiyo, Mihashi Tatsuya, Todoroki Yukiko, Ashikawa Izumi)

Swoon

Tom Kalin’s feature film debut tells the well-known story of Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb, two wealthy Jewish college students who kidnapped and brutally murdered a 14-year-old neighbourhood boy in Chicago in 1924.

(Country: USA; Year: 1992; Director: Tom Kalin; Writer: Tom Kalin, Hilton Als; Stars: Daniel Schlachtet, Craig Chester jr., Crowe Ron Vawter)

The Tiny Ventriloquist

A suite of short films.

(Country: Canada; Year: 2011; Director: Steve Reinke; Stars: with contributions from James Richards)

Tomorrow (Zavtra)

Review preview for Tomorrow

When a journalist is so embedded, a bit of historical accuracy and broader perspective might actually have helped.

Anton Bitel · 2 out of 5
Documentary about Russian artists' group Voina.

(Country: Russian Federation; Year: 2012; Director: Andrey Gryazev; Writer: Andrei Gryazev; Stars: Natalia Sokol, Kasper Vorotnikov, Oleg Vorotnikov, Leonid Nikolaev )

Full review

T.S.T.L.

This stop-motion video fools around with over- intellectualised conceptual art.

(Country: Lebanon; Year: 2011; Director: Gheith Al-Amine)

What Is Love

Five documentary miniatures show different models for dealing with life, for shaping life and love.

(Country: Austria; Year: 2012; Director: Ruth Mader)

Winter Nomads (Hiver Nomade)

Man, woman, sheep, adventure - the life of modern European shepherds.

(Country: Switzerland; Year: 2012; Director: Manuel von Stürler)

The Woman In The Septic Tank (Ang Babae sa Septic Tank)

As far as their film school final project is concerned, these three students have only one goal in mind – international fame, including Oscars and festival prizes. They know what foreign audiences expect from Philippine cinema – prostitution, abuse, rubbish tips and slums – and apply this magic formula to develop the ultimate in misery porn.

(Country: Philippines; Year: 2011; Director: Marlon N Rivera; Stars: Eugene Domingo, JM De Guzman, Kean Cipriano)