Berlin International Film Festival

Latest reviews

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  Meanwhile On Earth

  Review preview for Meanwhile On Earth

  There’s a sweet, melancholy flavour to Clapin’s work.

  Siblings Elsa and Franck were very close. Since Franck disappeared during a space mission three years ago, Elsa has struggled to move on with her life. Until one day she is contacted by an unidentified life form.
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  From Hilde, With Love

  Review preview for From Hilde, With Love

  This non-sensationalist approach allows much more room to address the psychological effects of prison life itself, whilst emphasising the mundanity of much of what happened under the Nazis.

  In Berlin 1942, Hilde finds her place within an anti-Nazi resistance group as gradually as she falls in love with one of its members. The two spend an unforgettable summer until they get caught by the Gestapo and Hilde is imprisoned, eight months pregnant.
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  Andrea Gets A Divorce

  Review preview for Andrea Gets A Divorce

  Although it could easily have been played as a farce, it’s friendship and human feeling that is the key to this film.

  Rural policewoman Andrea wants to end her marriage and become a detective inspector in the city. After a birthday party, her drunken soon-to-be ex-husband runs out in front of her car. In a state of shock, Andrea commits a hit-and-run.
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  The Cats Of Gokogu Shrine

  Review preview for The Cats Of Gokogu Shrine

  As ever, Soda’s style is patient, unintrusive, and warmly curious.

  Documentary about the cats that have set up home around the Shinto shrine in Ushimado.
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  No Other Land

  Review preview for No Other Land

  No Other Land brings humanity and particularity to a topic that is too often discussed in the abstract.

  This film made by a Palestinian-Israeli collective shows the destruction of the West Bank’s Masafer Yatta by Israeli authorities and the unlikely alliance which develops between the Palestinian activist Basel and Israeli journalist Yuval.
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  Small Things Like These

  Review preview for Small Things Like These

  I do not know that I could ever with a good conscience describe a film as 'perfect' but this comes close.

  A coal merchant discovers secrets being kept at a convent.
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  My Favourite Cake

  Review preview for My Favourite Cake

  While many other films feel as though they are really staking out a deliberate political stance against the Iranian regime or coming at it from deep within metaphor, My Favourite Cake is casually, but almost constantly, rebellious in small ways.

  A 70-year-old decides to break her solitary routine and revitalise her love life.
• 
  Made In England: The Films Of Powell And Pressburger

  Review preview for Made In England: The Films Of Powell And Pressburger

  Hinton’s documentary visually points to all the complicated, often triangular entanglements.

  Documentary about the acclaimed directors, their work and its legacy.
• 
  The Devil's Bath

  Review preview for The Devil's Bath

  Martin Gschlacht’s glorious and smart cinematography adds clarity here while sprinkling doubt over there.

  A woman struggles with her life, leading her to take desperate measures in 18th Century Austria.
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  L'Homme-Vertige: Tales Of A City

  Review preview for L'Homme-Vertige: Tales Of A City

  L’Homme Vertige forces you to lament changing cityscapes and the fate of residents at the mercy of local authorities and property developers

  Documentary about Point-a-Pitre in Guadeloupe.

A–Z of Berlin International Film Festival 2024 reviews →

Features

• Until the dance
  Andreas Dresen on resistance, ensemble storytelling and From Hilde, With Love
• The main dish
  Philippe Lesage with Ed Bahlman on Rock Lobster and Who By Fire
• On her own
  Atom Egoyan on Seven Veils, Amanda Seyfried, Salome and Oscar Wilde
• The joy of research
  Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala on Maria Hofstätter, the Brothers Grimm and The Devil's Bath
• Home truths
  Intercepted director Oksana Karpovych on aggression and resistance in Ukraine
• 'I wanted to make it look almost like an ancient documentary'
  Director Yihan Lin on space and texture in her short Sojourn To Shangri-La
• A world in balance
  Franco García Becerra and Annemarie Gunkel on the fine line between the fantastic and real in Through Rocks And Clouds
• Wanting to make a difference
  Jessica Hausner in conversation on Club Zero, Elsa Zylberstein and Mathieu Demy as parents, and Pied Piper of Hamelin
• 'It's about a feeling which is lost in adulthood - the complexity of simple things'
  Carlo Sironi on his coming-of-age movie My Summer With Irene
• 'I think, through the screen, we can gain a truthful reality'
  Dāvis Sīmanis on the cyclical nature of history and why we need to learn from it in Maria's Silence
• 'I really wanted to make a movie for the younger version of myself'
  Anthony Schatteman on love, authenticity and acceptance in Young Hearts
• 'I start working from a very intellectual perspective, but then it's a lot of intuition'
  Nelson Carlo de Los Santos Arias on experimentation and storytelling in Pepe
• Bigfoot challenge
  David and Nathan Zellner on turning a myth into a reality for Sasquatch Sunset
• Sorting fact from fiction
  Roman Bondarchuk on fake news, politics and the situation in Ukraine in The Editorial Office
• Sculpting a story
  Jianjie Lin on working layer by layer on Brief History Of A Family
• Family ties
  Klaudia Reynicke on crazy casting and bringing her own emotions to Reinas
• An act of observance
  Atom Egoyan on interpreting Salome and making Seven Veils
• Scorsese on Scorsese
  The legendary director talks about his life and career at BAFTA event

News

• Tom Tykwer's The Light to open Berlin Film Festival
  Lars Eidinger starrer offers portrait of a modern family put to the test
• Dahomey wins Golden Bear
  Mati Diop's doc takes top prize in Berlin