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Festival coverage

Berlin International Film Festival

20 February – 1 March 2020

The 70th edition of the festival will open with Philippe Falardeau’s My Salinger Year, starring Sigourney Weaver and Margaret Qualley. Dame Helen Mirren will receive and honorary Golden Bear, with the festival screening The Queen in tribute.

Other years (15)

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Latest reviews

  • Minyan
    Review preview for Minyan

    With a moody jazz score full of languorous clarinets, this is a long cool drink before the unseen war.

    Jennie Kermode · 4.5 out of 5
    New York in the 1980s. Seventeen-year-old David, who is tentatively beginning to express his homosexuality in the East Village gay scene, gradually starts to question the strict rules of his Jewish community.
  • One In A Thousand
    Review preview for One In A Thousand

    Following her subjects through the tangled streets, in an out of small concrete houses or under the archways and up the stairwells where they take shelter, Navas observes them almost as if she were filming a documentary, perhaps without permission.

    Jennie Kermode · 3.5 out of 5
    Iris is 17 and takes each day as it comes. When she meets the cool Renata, her life changes abruptly.
  • Anne At 13,000 ft
    Review preview for Anne At 13,000 ft

    It takes real craft to hold something like this together for 75 minutes - not to mention tremendous effort on Campbell's part.

    Jennie Kermode · 4.5 out of 5
    Even in her job at a children’s day care centre, Anne prefers fun to actual work and often alienates those around her with her erratic behaviour.
  • The Foundation Pit
    Review preview for The Foundation Pit

    Being hit squarely in the face with the sheer volume of these, often barely watched, entreaties is doubtless part of the point.

    Amber Wilkinson · 3.5 out of 5
    A found footage film compiled from countless YouTube videos in which the people of Russia make a direct appeal to President Putin.
  • First Cow
    Review preview for First Cow

    The simplest of pleasures bring the greatest moments of joy in Reichardt’s latest film.

    Matthew Anderson · 4.5 out of 5
    A cook with a group of fur trappers strikes up a connection with a Chinese emigre in the Old West.
  • Nardjes, A
    Review preview for Nardjes, A

    While the film may be light on political detail, Aïnouz captures the sense of an old struggle being made young again.

    Amber Wilkinson · 3 out of 5
    Documentary about an activist in Algeria.
  • Cuties
    Review preview for Cuties

    The complex interactions between the girls are beautifully captured.

    Jennie Kermode · 4.5 out of 5
    Amy, 11 years old, meets a group of dancers called "Cuties”. Fascinated, she initiates herself to a sensual dance, hoping to join their band and escape family dysfunction...
  • There Is No Evil
    Review preview for There Is No Evil

    Rasoulof schools us in the ins and outs of a judicial system in which not only those who are directly sentenced to death can find themselves condemned as a result.

    Amber Wilkinson · 4 out of 5
    Four stories that are variations on the crucial themes of moral strength and the death penalty.
  • Wildland
    Review preview for Wildland

    Well realised and engaging, with impressive production design.

    Jennie Kermode · 3 out of 5
    After her mother’s death, Ida moves in with her aunt and cousins... whose ethics are dubious.
  • Hope
    Review preview for Hope

    Hope is structured around seemingly small jolts that suddenly illuminate the big picture.

    Anne-Katrin Titze · 5 out of 5
    When Anja is diagnosed with a brain tumour, everyday life in her patchwork family implodes and her cooling relationship with her partner Tomas is faced with a new kind of reality.

A–Z of Berlin International Film Festival 2020 reviews

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