Russia (bbabo.net), - The 72nd International Berlin Festival announces prizes today. At this point, one can say that a cursory glance has been taken at the competitive programs - the offline festival lasted less than a week.
Covid regularly confused all plans - for example, at the last moment it became known that Isabelle Huppert would not come - she had a positive test. Meanwhile, the actress was supposed to be presented personally at the film festival this year with the prize "For Contribution to Cinema". Handed over. But - online. Fans enjoyed a retrospective of Huppert's films, and the program of the Berlinale Special gala premiere showed a new film starring her, À propos de Joan, directed by Lauren Larivier. The main feature of the picture is that the characters speak to themselves and to others at different periods of their lives and theirs. For example, Joan - the film is dedicated to her story - talks to herself as a small, young and grown-up. She also meets her son when he is young, and when he has already grown up. And this, too, is a different Joan all the time. And with his lover and fellow eccentric writer, he is played by Lars Eidinger. Adult Joan works as his French publisher. Thus, memories - flashbacks - become a reality for today, and the modern is transferred to the past. An amazing picture, the meaning of which is suitable for many things, because the Berlinale itself, like every person on it, constantly refers to its past, present and future, as if talking to itself.
Each festival is a kind of community with regular participants and favorites. It all depends on how committed he is to his traditions and favorites. Therefore, guessing - who can be given a prize - is a very simple matter. For example, director Denis Cote is always in favor at the Berlinale. Without his films, the competition, as they say, is incomplete. This year, Kote's three-hour film "That Kind of Summer" tells the story of a clinic where, for 26 days, three medical staff treat three girls whose disease is hypersexuality. Treatment comes down not so much to drugs, but to observing the pathology and trying to comprehend it with the help of psychoanalysis, frank conversations, and so on. Watching this film is quite tiring, but the idea of the director that you need to devote enough time to your peculiarities and deviations in order to overcome them and become normal people, otherwise nothing in life will change, is leading. If they can give a prize at the Berlinale Kote, they usually give it.
Although it would be more logical for the jury, which is headed by director M. Night Shyamalan, to award a film that deals with issues of life and death in an artistic way. Shyamalan himself likes to speculate on this topic in his paintings. And if you combine the names of his two films "Time" and "Glass" in a bizarre play on words - you get the phrase "Time is up." What to do - the epidemic takes away both young and old today, and rethinking the issues of life and death in cinema is more relevant than ever. This topic is most fully disclosed in two competitive films. The first is the Swiss "Piece of Sky" (A Piece of Sky) directed by Michael Koch. The events in the film take place in a picturesque Swiss village - a kind of paradise on earth. People and animals live here, it would seem, in harmony. Periodically in the picture, against the background of natural landscapes, the choir sings, and its sound is truly unearthly. The main character - a simple seasonal worker - finds his love, marries a local girl. Everything would be fine, but he is constantly haunted by the fear of death. He is hypersensitive, hard going through the death of even the smallest creature. And, alas, his time is coming. Doctors find he has a fatal disease, a tumor in the brain that looks like an eye (such a comparison is not accidental). He himself begins to behave like an animal. But in the end, he will have to come to terms with the inevitable.
The second film is "Leonora, goodbye!" (Leonora addio) Paolo Taviani. The films of the Taviani brothers have already entered the gold fund of cinema. And they have a special relationship with the Berlinale. One can, for example, recall that the painting by the Taviani brothers "Caesar Must Die" (again the theme of death) received the "Golden Bear" at one time. Three years after the departure of his brother Vittorio, Paolo reflects on the eternal in the new film, using the example of the life and death of the writer, Nobel laureate Luigi Pirandello. In a film that shows us the very style for which fans love old Italian cinema, there is a lot of chronicle mixed with fiction. It is very picturesque, meditative, and already at the premiere it became clear that this tape would also become a classic, regardless of whether it received The Bear.Obviously, Claire Denis will not leave the Berlinale this year without prizes. We wrote about her new work "Both Sides of the Blade". Juliette Binoche, who played in it a woman who loves two men at once, may well receive a prize for the best role. Now he is alone at the Berlinale - without division into male and female components. Binoche's serious competitor for this award is the Turkish-German actress Maltem Kaptan, who played the world's mother - in every sense - in the film "Rabbi Kurnatz vs. George Bush" directed by Andreas Dresen.
If the times of the pandemic did not bring so many restrictions, one could prophesy an award for the best role of Sigourney Weaver or Elizabeth Banks - for the main roles in the film "Call Jane". However, the actresses did not come to the festival. Unless they will be awarded the award virtually. And it is worth adding that it would be strange - if suddenly the prize is given to a man this year - the competition, and the festival as a whole, has such a strong turn towards women in cinema. Everything is in line with global trends. If we still talk about men, then it can be Denis Menashe (Francois Ozon's film "Peter von Kant") or Michael Thomas ("Rimini" by Ulrich Seidl).
However, it is quite possible that the jury headed by M. Night Shyamalan will give preference to films about art. No wonder the chairman of the jury has in his filmography a picture that glorified him more than others - "The Sixth Sense". That is what people of art have. And there are a lot of pictures about them in the competition. In addition to the films "Peter von Kant", "Rimini" and "Features" by Ursula Mayer, which we talked about, this is the film "Writer's Film" by Korean director Hong Sang-soo. He is also a frequent guest of the Berlinale competition, and several "Bears" adorn his prize shelf. The new work is to some extent a cry from the heart, although everything in it happens with sometimes quite funny Korean politeness for a European. The main character is a writer who is quite disappointed with her acquaintances in life, and they are also creative people. Her colleague stopped writing and opened a café for people who read. A familiar director was not in tune with her. And then she herself decides to make a film and invites an actress to it, who turned out to be unclaimed. But they are both on the same wavelength.
Back to news director from Cambodia Rithi Panh. It stands out from the 18 entries in the competition. At the Berlinale, they love and welcome such films. Suffice it to recall "Touchless", which won in 2018. The tape "Everything will be fine" was made with minimal financial costs. In front of us are figures of animals. Sometimes flat, sometimes 3D. They grunt, moo, bleat, quack... The sound is still a cacophony. And also the viewer sees the wrong side of the computer world - monitors, wires, screens, which show how people can show their bestial instincts. Including very cruel shots of torture, abuse of animals and so on. When viewing, I want to say, referring to the creators of not only this picture, but also some others viewed here - if you talk about violence, cruelty in your work, this does not mean that you need to apply the same methods in relation to the viewer. Albeit in the light of today's current events.
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