Internationale Filmfestspiele Berlin

As I said before, I would soon be putting my reviews and information about the Berlinale on my blog. I have linked the official Berlinale website to this post and you should be able to access by clicking on the title of this post.

So to begin, let me just briefly describe the Berlinale. The Berlinale is an International Film Festival that is hosted here in Berlin annually. This year was the 58th running of the festival. The Berlinale kicked off with the unveiling of the red carpet on Thursday, February 7. The festival lasted until yesterday, Sunday, February 17th. The festival had several categories of screening and took place in several cinemas and theatres all across Berlin. The most well known category is the Competition Category (Wettbewerb). This is the category where films are judged and receive awards at the end of the festival. Other categories included Panorama, Forum, Berlinale Special, Berlinale Shorts, Perspektive Deutsches Kino, Generation, Wiederholungnen, Retrospective, and Forum Expanded. Hundreds of films were shown, some German premiers, some European premiers, and I even got to see a couple of World Premiers. The Forum and the Forum expanded was the category of films that I was able to see. I got to see 12 screenings of films in 8 days. I was quite exciting, although some of the films weren't that good haha. So yeah, I'm gonna lists each film I saw with the description the program listed (because otherwise you might be thoroughly confused), and then post my review. I also rated each film with stars (*) on a 5 star scale. Enjoy!

1. MY WINNIPEG - By Guy Maddin (2.08.2008, 19:00) Canada, English:
Description - Winnipeg, Winnipeg, Winnipeg. "We Winnipegers are so stuperfied with Nostalgia." Their stupefication turns them into sleepwalkers. There are so many of them that they made a law: If, you due to the power of their deep spiritual kinship, they turn up at night in their old homes, the new inhabitants must take them in. My Winnipeg is a sleepwalking dream: While working on this autobiography, which is like the biography of every snowed-in place in the Canadian province of Manitoba ("a city just 4 years older than my grandmother"), Maddin found himself once again in this childhood home. Actors pose as brothers, sisters, and the family dog in the living room. In the background is the mother like aliving picture. The current inhabitant, an elderly woman, doesn't move from her armchair. If you travel into the past in Winnipeg, you can't shake the aged present. We know the passive-aggressive mother already from "Bran upon the Brain!" In that film she exerted her control using a giant telescope, here she gazes (in king-size) scrutinizingly into the window of the Canadian railway, as Winnipeg is the crosspoint. Guy Maddin's new film solidifies the idea that, looking at the totality of his work, we can speak of a Maddinesque genre: profound, unsettling, and as such primally cinematic.

My Review - Live narration was very nice, different style documentary, good film and archive footage, the shorts of Green Porno before was a good lead. I liked the mix of history and family life. Interesting, but confusing at times. ***

2. MY BROTHER'S WEDDING - By Charles Burnett (2.09.2008, 12:30) USA, English:
Description - Pierce, a young black man in Los Angeles, is caught in a moral dilemma: his successful older brother is getting married, and he's asked Pierce to be his best man. On the same day as the wedding, however, his best friend's funeral is also taking place, a criminals who was brutally murdered shortly after being released from prison. Which ceremony should Pierce attend? Last year Charles Burnett's 1977 directorial debut Killer of Sheep, one of the most important works of African-American cinema, was re-introduced at the Forum. Following this, Burnett was able to make a director's cut of hi second film. My Brother's Wedding, made in 1983, is also set in original locations, and here as well what is foregrounded is not a classical story, but an attitude to life. Pierce works in his parents' small dry cleaners, there aren't many customers, their clothes are worn to threads. The camera follows him on his way through the run-down black neighborhood of South Central. It seems like the streets have been swept empty, the people seem to have barricaded themselves into their homes, most of them have a gun in a drawer somewhere. The sound on the street is still blues and soul, and not yet hip-hop, and nobody's wearing gold chains yet, or carrying automatic weapons. Still, My Brother's Wedding can be seen as a kind of forerunner of the African-American ghetto and gangsta film.

My Review - 20 years old, but still with good film quality. The problem presented in the film goes along with the plot, but the actual storyline wasn't that good. The excitement and problem only came at the end of the film. Reminded me of Seinfeld, as a movie about nothing, only no where near as funny or amusing. Scene transitions were rather harsh. Actors were surprisingly good for ameaturs. **

3. TRIBU - By Jim Libiran (2.11.2008, 22:30) Philippinen, Tagalog:
Description - In Tondo, the gloomiest area of Manila, youth gangs dominate the street scene. Their lives consist of criminality, drugs, and hip-hop music. In the twilight of the underworld, 10-year-old Ebet observes the members of enemy gangs, whose meeting becomes inescapable and which finally leads to an explosion of raw violence. Jim Libiran is the first director in 30 years who has been able to film in Manila's notorious Tondo district. The majority of his actors were recruited from among the inhabitants of the slum, most of them members of enemy street gangs, whose enthusiasm for their acting is catching. During the shooting of the film deadly hostilities gradually turned into friendships. Tribu is not only a film, but also a social project - but mos of all a rare cinematic event, spilling over with energy. Sex and violence are here not merely the surface, but they function as a vehicle for the realistic illustration of this ignored parallel world. The authentic rap soundtrack was collectively composed by the four main actors. Tribu is fragile, edgy, and real - an independent production that is one of the best from a stong year in Philippine film

My Reveiw - Plot was ok, slow at times, fight scene very fake, but a good story and it was a believable youth lifestyle. I didn't like the camera quality, but I enjoyed the rap and soundtrack music. I liked the role of Ebet, yet was confused by it sometimes. Nice post-screening discussion with the director. ***

4. THE EXILES - By Kent Mackenzie (2.12.2008, 21:30) USA, English:
Description - Like many others of her generation of Native Americans, Yvonne grew up in a reservation before moving to Los Angeles. She shares a two-room apartment with her husband Homer and five other young Indians. Since Yvonne got pregnant, her thoughts have been constantly revolving around the future, her own and that of her baby. The men, on the other hand, live from the fleeting kicks that they find in the restless nights on the streets of downtown and in the main street bars. After researching in the native American community in Los Angeles for years, Kent Mackenzie began working with his protagonists on The Exiles in 1957. the film, which was completed three years later, is one of the first - and still very few - films about young Indians in the big city. For his empathetic observations, Mackenzie found poetic forms far from any kind of romanticizing. His graphic sense for nocturnal Los Angeles, the use of interviews with the actors as the inner monologues of the protagonists, and the soundtrack of the rock 'n' roll band "The Revels" from radios and jukeboxes make The Exiles a masterpiece of great beauty and integrity. Its restoration closes another gap in the history of independent cinema.

My Review - Slow plot and boring to whatch, no real story, bad choice for a Berlinale film, bad actors, filmography was good and the movement of scenes and the shots were nice, great restoration, but the dubbing was bad. *

5. NIRVANA - By Igor Voloshin (2.13.2008, 12:30) Russia, Russian:
Description - Fed up with her life in Moscow, nurse Alisa moves to St. Petersburg. Her roomates in the collective flat are two junkies, Valera and her boyfriend Dead Man. First they fight, but soon the two women form a tender and substantial friendship. Together they even go after the Petersburg underworld when Dead Man is abducted because he can't pay his debts. Life is hard and confusing and you have to act hard and cool if you want to get by. This attitude toward life in Nirvana doesn't serve as a sociological frame, but as an aesthetic challenge to be met. When it comes to soundtrack, location, and above all the actors, Voloshin gives proof of his sense of style and detail. The extravagant make-up and elaborate costumes in which some of the protagonists perform, the exquisite exterior shots of Petersburg, and the lavish interiors are reminiscent of a pop opera, or of Brecht reborn as a punk, once again inventing the alienation effect. And every once a while you think you spot hidden allusions in all the visual laivshness. Is it because there is a common film canon each generation shares, or does it reveal an exceptional talen? Simply both.

My Review - Best so far, good character development, good cinematography and good music. The plot development reminded me of Fight Club. The make-up and costumes reminded me of Queen Amidala from Star Wars. I didn't understand the costumes and make-up, but I liked the changing of the story and the characters. It also had a good political point of view of post-Soviet Russia. ****

6. SEAVIEW - By Paul Rowley (2.13.2008, 21:30) Ireland, English:
Description - In the postwar period, exactly 60 years ago, the seaside holiday camp Monsey was founded in Ireland to give families a temporary refuge from their everyday life. Today the place is used for another kind of place of refuge: as a home for asylum seekers, most of whom remain there for several years. "Passages are houses or walkways that have no outside - like a dream." says Walter Benjamin in the "Passagenwerk." Inside the low grey buildings is a completely equipped world of entertainment. The camera wanders dreamily through the abandoned dance hall, an empty swimming pool, through dining halls, children's play areas, along the slot machines, colorful plastic decorations, neon signs touting fish & chips. Each time before it once again stops in front of a door maked "Push Bar to Open," other spaces open up: mattrasses and bedding stacked up to the ceiling, second hand shopping clothes and shopping turn the dream into a nightmare, without transition and in unchanged pastel tones. "The new business," is how one employee refers to the change from tourism to directing a refugee camp with a seaview. At least the children have the possibility of getting education and a creative shape to their everyday life. but the stories of their parents, who came from Nigeria, Somalia, Russia, or Croatia with quite different expectations, thwart the smooth pans again and again.

My Review - Very good, great imagery and cinematography. Great interviews and stories. The were well composed with pictures and videos and music. I liked the metaphor with the seagull. Very interesting people. Great perspective coming from the idea of American immigration problems. A little too long for a documentary. Very nice. World premier? ****

7. EL CAMINO - By Ishtar Yasin Gutierrez (2.14.2008, 12:30) Costa Rica and France, Spanish:
Description - 12-year-old Saslaya and her younger brother Dario have been living with their grandfather in Nicaragua since their mother went to Costa Rica to look for work eight years ago. Saslaya, who has to work in the rubbish dumps after school and gets called to her grandfather's hammock at night, runs away with her brother. On the journey to Costa Rica they meet many different people: a street kid that they befriend of the short time that they're in the city, an older man who runs a pupper theater, immigrant who are looking for work in Costa Rica as well. With its partly documentary view, El camino no only follows the search for the mother - a search that is a reality for many children in Nicaragua - it also makes it possible to look deep into the region that the protagonists are crossing. The director Ishtar Yasin Gutierrez has conducted years of research on the children left behind by immigrants. She chose actors with a similar fate to the one her characters have experienced. It is an impressive and moving film debut that tells much more than just the story of a brother and sister's journey.

My Review - I didn't really enjoy this film. It started off nice, and the message was good, although sometimes hard to define. Cinematography wasn't the greatest. Needed more dialogue and a plot. The two men and the table were all that kept me entertained. Acting was ok. **

8. BALIKBAYAN BOX - By Mes De Guzman (2.15.2008, 19:45) Philippinen, Tagalog:
Description - Three boys grow up together in a small village. Their favorite place to spend time is the "Betamax House," an improvised cinema, located in a modest apartment block, where the owner shows pirated copies of popular Hollywood movies. But the country idyll is clouded by social problems. The poverty of the area leads not only to petty theft and emigration, but in the end it sets off a series of crimes. The title of the film refers to a social phenomenon that takes on an important function in this independently produced film: Philippnie immigrants regularly send care packages, Balikbayan boxes, back home to help out their families. Patiently and intensely, the camera observes what goes on in the village, getting a feel for everyday life, here manifest as a struggle for survival. In the process, images and gestures take on more significance than speech. the special quality of this film is seen in its mise-en-scene, as understated as it is profound. Sensitively and almost as if by chance, director de Guzman conveys the existential cares and needs of his protagonists without overtly drawing attention to them. Balikbayan Box is told in a deliberately quiet way, laying bare its characters' humanity in a way that leaves a lasting impression.

My Review - This film was also not very enjoyable and unbearingly long. It had no conceivable plot or story that could be derived from just viewing the film without reading the description. The cinematography was well done, with some nice images and shots. This film could have also used a lot more dialogue. **

9. SOUTH MAIN - By Kelly Parker (2.16.2008, 20:00) USA, English:
Description - In order to contain violence on the streets and rampant gang crime, city authorities decided in December 2004 to clear out and tear down one complete apartment block in South Central Los Angeles. The inhabitants, living below the poverty line and dependent on state support, received compensation and had to move on short notice. The film follows three African-American women, all of the single mothers, in their lives at their new homes. Latisha relates how her fiance was killed on his way home in a random shooting shortly before the move. The film gives her a full ten minutes to describe the inconceivable. It is a scene of great intensity that brings the filmmaker's attitude to a point: being there, listening, noticeably letting the time go by. No lurid wallowing in myths of the ghetto, no conjuring up of the "social powder-kep" no social kitsch, but instead a participatory, exact view, concentrating on the women themselves. Precise, strictly framed images result from this, which neither accuse us nor appeal to us but that simply show. Images from the underclass, telling of poverty and the precarious living conditions on the social periphery. Images from America at the beginning of the 21st century.

My Review - A great portrayal of a low class American life-style. The undertone was very liberal however. The way the film was shot was unique, I felt. It appeared like the audience was the interviewer, instead of simply viewing an interview in a documentary. The subjects in the film worked well for the message. It was apparent, as the director stated afterwards, taht the intial message was different from the outcome. The director seemed very amateur for a well done film. The Q & A session wasn't as good as I had hoped...she struggled a bit. ***

10. YEARS WHEN I WAS A CHILD OUTSIDE - By John Torres (2.16.2008, 22:30) Philippines:
Description - Years When I was a Child Outside (Family Multi-Channel) is, at once, a mediation. It is a meta-film that unravels into the journey of the son of best-selling self-help author Rodolfo Torres, who had pioneered the sale of instructional books and tapes to "help raise brighter children" in the Philippines during the early 1980s. Upon learning that his father bore illegitimate children, the narrator decides to run away. The film is not only a chronicle of stories through foreign regions, but also a probing letter from outside circles, an honest account of illegitimate views form uneven terrain, and a narrative-driven exploration of the nooks and peripheries of the body, geography, and weather. As the journey progresses, the film increasingly traverses the countries of revelation, film, and heart - to where all journeys are meant to end with.

My Review - Yet another Philippine movie....must be a fascination of Mark's. I liked the style of the film, and the unique and new technological approach. The live band was a perfect touch to the new viewing style of muliple projections, however I felt like they should have been used more. The movie was also far too long and the message was not clear and very boring to the point where it was stomach turning. It was such a disappointment for a new style of film presentation. *

11. IF ONE THING MATTERS - By Heiko Kalmbach (2.17.2008, 13:00) Germany, German:
Description - Wolfgang Tillmans became known during the nineties for his photos of parties and club life. His pictures had the effect of having been taken at random. Today he is one of the best-known photographers in the world. For four years, filmmaker Heiko Kalmbach followed him around with a video camera, observing his private as well as his professional life. If One Thing Matters. It is Tillmans's voice speaking and not that of any expert. In its presumed casualness, the film stays right with its protagonist, whether Tillmans is lovingly wiping the dust off his houseplants or, equally precisely and meticulously, he's putting up one of his exhibitions with the patience of Job. Of particular interest are glimpses into Tillmans's video debut for the pop band Pet Shop Boys, which make it clear that his inner readiness to fail is also what makes his success possible. Whether he's portraying dazzling stars or grey mice, Tillmans's artistic greatness is in the catching unexpected moment, for, as Tillmans says, "stuff that's thought-up will always just be thought-up stuff." by consolidating the banal and the glamourous at the same level, always catching the unexpected moment, Kalmbach successful emulates his subject.

My Review - Great film, very interesting. The documentary was well done, with great cinematography and a wonderful story line. The main subject, Wolfgang, was an entertaining character to watch and see grow. His works and messages were also brilliant. The image and sound quality of the film were also well done. It was at some point a little repetative and I got a little lost in the time-line and where he was exactly, but still a very good film. ****

12. CORROBOREE - By Ben Hackworth (2.17.2008, 19:00) Australia, English:
Description - Conor a young actor, leaves for an acting job in the countryside. Following precise instructions, he and his fellow actresses are supposed to re-enact scenes from the life of Joe, a terminally ill director. Yet the setting is more spring-like than morbid and Conor makes himself familiar not only with Joe's life but with the place, a sort of spiritual hotel. The film's title refers to an Australian Aboriginal dance ritual, and Conor comes across as an invited guest at a ritual who initially has only a vague idea of its meaning. It is the strict emphasis on form that is immanent to both, ritual and film. Hackworth fortunately refrains from conventional narrative tricks and psychohlogically one-dimensional and predictable characters. His narrative movements are circular instead of following a straight line. And the gap that is layed out in the constant double role play offers to deliberate narrative story-telling as such. The excellent ensemble makes sure that this is not a mere intellectual pleasure. Insofar as Friedrich Schiller's concept of the "Spieltrieb" (the play drive) defines playing as a link between sensual and intellectual perception, Corroboree displays a very playful director. Let's hope, he'll never grow up.

My Review - Really weird! It was almost as if I was thrown into the middle of a movie. I didn't have any sense of the story, or plot, or what was actually going on. There was good cinematography and filming as well as good actors. The character development was present, but sometimes confusing. The story even ended abruptly without explaining what was happening. Good technically, but bad writing. ***

So there ya go. Those were all the films I viewed at the Berlinale. I hope you enjoy the reviews and comment if you have any questions. I also want to tell you that the Berlinale intro to every screening was made very well and I always looked forward to seeing it for every film. There is a video sample of it on the Berlinale site.