Berlin Premiere ‘City’ Tells Untold Stories of Thessaloniki’s Jews During WWII

Resembling more of a personal tribute than exhaustive biography, Pietro Marcello‘s Lucio Dalla documentary, “For Lucio,” takes its title as an invitation. A rambling eulogy that is just as often confusing as it is profound, Marcello’s wisp of a film (running less than 80 minutes) may be missing key context for those not already versed in the life and music of the politically-oriented Italian singer-songwriter.

Many of Hong Sang-soo’s films are structured around a woman’s solitary wanderings. The single ladies played by Kim Min-Hee in “On the Beach at Night Alone” or “The Woman Who Ran,” or Lee Hye-Young in “In Front of Your Face,” are free radicals, moving from encounter to encounter and disrupting the equilibrium of the people they meet, as meandering conversations reveal a friend’s dissatisfaction or a couple’s disagreement.

Gail Halvorsen was a United States Air Force pilot known as the “Candy Bomber” for dropping candy over Berlin from his airplane during the Berlin airlift in 1948.  Gail Halvorsen joined the Air Force as a pilot during World War II, serving as a transport pilot in the South Atlantic. After World War II, Berlin was divided into four sections occupied by the United States, France, England, and Russia.

Leaves rustle in the wind, sand swiftly lifted from the ground as it resumes its nomadic journey, taking from one place to give to another. Around it, all seems to be consumed by stillness, but, in the safety of this deceiving quietness, life bursts through settled roots to create anew.

Premiering in the Special Gala section of this year’s Berlinale, the latest film from Italian director Dario Argento is surprising in more ways than one. Rather than copy the style of the giallo films from the 1970s and 1980s that made him famous (“The Bird with the Crystal Plumage,” “Deep Red,” and “Suspiria,” to cite just a few), his “Dark Glasses” finds ingenious ways to retain the core of the giallo while adapting to our current times.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief“The Novelist’s Film,” which Wednesday earned Korean director Hong Sang-soo the Grand Jury Prize in Berlin, has scored multiple rights deals. With Seoul-based Finecut handling the rights sales, the film was licensed to Ama Films for Greece and Cyprus, Mimosa Films for Japan, L’Atalante Cinema for Spain, Arizona Films Distribution for France and to The Cinema Guild for the U.S.Finecut also did European Film Market business with “Contorted,” an unorthodox horror about a family tragedy.

BERLIN -- The Catalan family drama “Alcarràs” won the Golden Bear award for best movie at the Berlin International Film Festival on Wednesday.Director Carla Simón's film was picked from a field of 18 by a seven-member jury under American filmmaker M. Night Shyamalan.He said the movie was honored “for its extraordinary performances, from the child actors to the actors in their 80s, for the ability to show the tenderness and comedy of family and struggle, and for the betrayal of our connection and dependence on the land around us.”The film depicts a family that spends its summers picking peaches in an orchard in a village in Spain's Catalonia region, but faces new owners who plan to replace the peach trees with solar panels.Meltem Kaptan took the best leading performance honor for the title role in German director Andreas Dresen's “Rabiye Kurnaz vs.

Alissa Simon Film CriticUzbekistan-born Michael Borodin makes a searing feature debut with the Russia-Turkey-Slovenia co-production “Convenience Store,” a story of modern slavery in Moscow, taking places under the noses of thousands of indifferent witnesses. Demonstrating his interest in pressing social issues, Borodin’s Berlinale Panorama selection was inspired by his personal experience as an illegal immigrant to Russia and the 2012 case of the “Golyanovo slaves,” which is now making its way to the European Court of Human Rights.Developed through the Next Step program of Cannes’ Critics’ Week and other co-production markets, the film, like the case of the Golyanovo slaves, centers on citizens of the former Soviet Republics, who are illegal migrants to Moscow and forced to work long hours, unpaid, in 24/7 convenience shops, without being able to leave the premises.

It sounds like the set-up to a French New Wave film: a French au pair falls in love with an Irish pickpocket leading to a whirlwind romance that changes both their lives. It might be twee, but Joan Verra (Isabelle Huppert) lived it, and on a long, rainy, nighttime drive reflects on the intense, yet fleeting relationship of her youth.

Sat in front of a computer, musician Nick Cave reads a few questions aloud. These are deeply existential musings sent in by people he has never met.

Despite her young age, Indian-born British actress Alia Bhatt has sustained herself as a leading lady in Hindi cinema for the past decade, racking up credits including Gully Boy, Raazi and Highway.

Elsa Keslassy International CorrespondentLoco Films, the Paris-based world sales and production company, has unveiled the trailer for Yulia Trofimova’s feature debut “The Land of Sasha” which is premiering today at the Berlinale, in the Generation 14plus strand.“The Land of Sahsa” tells the story of an indecisive 18-year-old struggling to pursue his desire to become a painter as his mother urges him to choose a safer career path. The sudden appearance of the boy’s estranged father complicates things further. But when Sasha has an unexpected encounter with an unusual girl called Zhenia, he realizes he has no choice but to finally grow up.“The Land of Sasha” was produced by Katerina Mikhaylova and Konstantin Fam for Moscow-based Vega Film.

Holly Jones By way of improvisation, relying heavily on events to naturally develop, Argentine filmmaker Gastón Solnicki presents a meandering ode to the city of Vienna, its customs, cultures, facades, and the near-sacrilege of enacting a smoking ban in cafes city-wide.In, “A Little Love Package,” two main protagonists become the vehicles through which the minutiae of everyday life in Vienna unfolds. Experimental aural and visual cues present themselves as Angeliki (Angeliki Papoulia) and Carmen (Carmen Chaplin) seek the perfect apartment in a city suspended in time.Produced by Little Magnet Films, out of Austria, and Solnicki’s Argentine production company, Filmy Wiktora, “A Little Love Package” is the fifth cinematic feature for Solnicki, whose entire catalog was recently acquired by MOMA.

The streets outside her window are dripping with hope, and yet Élisabeth (Charlotte Gainsbourg) is lost. It is Paris, 1981, a new president has been elected, and Élisabeth’s husband has left, claiming the thrillingness of motion by moving in with a new girlfriend while his ex is left with the stagnance of remaining, the apartment where they’ve raised their children, Judith (Megan Northam) and Matthias (Quito Rayon-Richter), at once comfortingly familiar and dreadfully new.

Elsa Keslassy International CorrespondentMemento International has closed major sales on Ursula Meier’s Berlin contender “The Line,” and “Boy from Heaven” by Tarik Saleh, the Swedish-Egyptian helmer of “The Nile Hilton Incident.” A religious and political thriller, “Boy From Heaven” is set in Cairo, in a Koranic school following the collapse of a grand imam which marks the start of a ruthless battle for influence.The movie is headlined by Tawfeek Barhom and Fares Fares, who previously starred in “The Nile Hilton Incident.” Saleh’s Stockholm-based outfit Atmo is producing the movie with Memento. Memento International has sold the film to Benelux (Cineart), Spain (La Aventura), Italy (Movies Inspired), Greece (Cinobo), Hungary (Vertigo) and Middle East (Falcon). Other territories in negotiation.

Of all the unsolved mysteries in Claire Denis‘ new Berlin Competition film, the biggest may just be its U.S. retitling to a generic and not particularly representative “Fire.” The film’s English title in the rest of the world, “Both Sides of the Blade” — a line from the terrific Tindersticks track that ends the film —is not just cooler and more compelling.

Tim Dams One of the highlights of the Berlinale Series Market is the pitch event Co-Pro Series, which looks to match projects with suitable co-producers and financiers.Ten international series projects from Europe, Canada and Latin America have been selected to pitch at this year’s Co-Pro Series, where they will also have the opportunity of meeting one-on-one with potential partners.Taking place over two days (Feb. 15-16), and held online once again due to the pandemic, Co-Pro Series has a track record of showcasing drama projects that have not only gone on to be produced, but that have also achieved success.International hit “Babylon Berlin,” Austrian-German crime series “Freud,” Norwegian-German domestic terrorism drama “Furia,” Icelandic thriller “Blackport” and 1920s-set German drama “Eldorado KaDeWe” have all participated in previous Co-Pro Series pitches.

Naman Ramachandran Acclaimed Bangladeshi director Rubaiyat Hossain, known for her powerful women-centric films, has a new project participating in the Berlinale Co-Production Market and is launching a female filmmaker grant.Her Berlinale co-production market project, “The Difficult Bride,” follows Novera, a bride-to-be in present-day Dhaka who is in love with the groom and the idea of a fairytale wedding, but secretly struggles with her body, which does not seem to comply with the wedding rituals. She makes continuous trips to the beauty salon and uses home remedies to “cure” her body.

Demystifying and questioning the very notion of authenticity, Jason Kohn’s informative and oddly riveting, diamond-documentary “Nothing Lasts Forever” is ostensibly about the oft-antagonistic relationship between natural and synthetic diamonds. Yet, diamonds are an in-road as Kohn explores the commodification of such abstractions as love and desire, questioning how exactly a shiny rock — one that isn’t even that rare — became a physical manifestation of commitment.