Return to Berlin: Berlinale 2016

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Parent Category: Film Festivals

Category: Features

Published on Monday, 22 February 2016 23:30

Written by Marian Masone

Indignation

The last time I attended the Berlinale (aka Berlin International Film Festival) was in February of 1990, a mere three months after the Wall came down. It was also my first time in Berlin. As a child of the Cold War, it was a strange experience. Sirens made me feel as though I were in the middle of WWII. The eastern part of the city was cool, but dodgy.

This year I returned to Berlin and to the Berlinale for the first time in 26 years. And it was as if for the first time. It’s difficult to tell east from west, except for a long trail of small red bricks in the sidewalk that marks the original site of the Wall. But much of the city is totally universally commercial: all the same stores that you would see in any other city in the states and Western Europe. Excuse me: probably anywhere else in the world.

The festival has changed and grown as well. As with other international festivals, there are any number of sections that each focus on a particular kind of film, although the definitions at Berlin seem very flexible. I mean I really don’t see too much difference between the Panorama (“International auteur cinema for passionate audiences”) section and the Forum (official title, International Forum of New Cinema), wherein “young filmmakers test the boundaries of perception.”

Really, does James Schamus fall into the “auteur” category yet as a director? His film Indignation marks his feature film debut and plays in the Panorama section. Based on the Philip Roth novel and set in the middle of the last century, it recounts a young man’s experiences from his youth in Newark through his years at a strict rural college. Indignation is not so much a coming of age film and a growing up and growing away from home film.

As for young filmmakers testing boundaries, while Eugene Greene pushes boundaries in his films, I wouldn’t consider him young, either in age or filmography. Regardless, his latest film, Le fils de Joseph, with Mathieu Almaric, shows the lighter side of this auteur (yes, an auteur in the Forum section). Greene’s work is always very cerebral and while Le fils de Joseph is full of subtleties and thought-provoking moments, it also has a great amount of wit and charm to it, something that may bring the filmmaker more admirers, which he deserves.

Another not-new face in the Forum is Guillaume Nicloux. Nicloux’s last film The Valley played in Cannes’ competition and starred Gérard Depardieu and Isabelle Huppert as parents of a suicide who roam Death Valley at their son’s request beyond the grave. The End stars Depardieu (again) as a man wandering in the woods (at least) who loses his dog there and then loses his own way, in more ways than one.

But I digress. Sections have never been truly important except to steer filmgoers in general directions.  For instance, Ira Sachs’ (Love is Strange, 2014) latest film, Little Men, plays in the Generation section. Generation includes films about children and young people but not necessarily only for young audiences. While the film stars known adult actors such as Greg Kinnear, Jennifer Ehle and Alfred Molina (who also gave a stunning performance in Love is Strange), it is the friendship between two preteen boys, played by Michael Barbieri and Theo Taplitz that is the centerpiece of the film and the performances by these young men – boys, really – is outstanding.

The really big films are in the Competition. There has to be a competition; otherwise, there are no prizes to give out. Included in this year’s competition are some old hands. The Commune is directed by Thomas Vinterberg (The Celebration, Submarino) and is loosely based on his own childhood. That is, growing up in the 70s he lived with his parents in  communal experiment which allowed much freedom but also exposed many dangers.

Also in the competition, Mia Hansen Løve’s L’Avenir is a jewel of a film, and stands head above her last effort, Eden. Here, Isabelle Huppert plays a women dealing with everything life has to throw at her – not in a melodramatic way, but in an almost banal way. In a subtle but constantly forward-moving way, Huppert drags us along with her into the process of living. Huppert was robbed of the acting award, IMHO (it went to The Commune lead female actor Tryne Dyrholm). But director Hansen Løve was rewarded with the directing prize.

As it is with each section: living, breathing films that tell us new stories and old stories. And we hope that all filmmakers tell their stories in refreshing ways.

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