Berlin Rebooted: Festival Shuffles Lineup, Aims for Recharged Market

An impoverished laborer returns home one day to find that social services have taken his children, after the family’s increasingly dire circumstances push his wife to commit a desperate act. With a corrupt local administrator blocking the way to a fair hearing to get them back, the man decides to cross the country on foot in order to plead his case to the government in Belgrade.

Overshadowed by a grisly, racially motivated shooting in western Germany and the growing pains of new festival leadership, this year’s Berlinale served to illuminate the market dynamics and global issues set to impact the international film and television industry in the run-up to Cannes — provided coronavirus stays away from the Croisette.

FRANKFURT, Germany -- Iranian director Mohammad Rasoulof's “There Is No Evil” won the Golden Bear prize Saturday for best picture at the Berlin Film Festival. Rasoulof wasn't there to accept the award due to a travel ban imposed on him by Iranian authorities.

Iranian director Mohammad Rasoulof’s drama “There Is No Evil” took home the top Golden Bear prize at the 2020  Berlin Film Festival.

By Nancy Tartaglione

BERLIN -- Held in the German capital from Feb. 20 to March 1, the Berlin International Film Festival is taking a darker view of the world, perhaps a reflection on the current state of world affairs, on its 70th anniversary. That focus is apparent in one of the festival’s most-awaited premieres, "Berlin Alexanderplatz," an adaptation of the seminal book by Alfred Döblin set in 1920s Berlin.

Few of the executives hustling from meeting to meeting amidst the non-stop stress of this year's European Film Market (EFM) in Berlin would take the time to think of the environment, much alone their own mental health. But people's growing awareness of the global climate crisis and, within the film and television industries, of a home-made mental health crisis, have put both issues in focus.

A little bit of the Berlinale is here at Hollywood News today, ladies and gentlemen. Yes, I’ve got a Berlin International Film Festival review to file.

Berlin’s European Film Market has gotten off to a slow start — but there are signs of life. Leonine, the new German studio formed last year by KKR’s acquisition and merger of German indies Tele Munchen Group and Universum, picked up German-speaking rights for the Gerard Butler action thriller Remote Control from STXinternational in a mid-seven-figure deal, the largest reported pact of the EFM so far.

The 70th anniversary of the Berlin International Film Festival should be a cause for celebration. But recent revelations about the festival's first director, Dr.

Defiant Dedryck Boyata insists Scottish football's snipers have got it all wrong because Celtic helped make him a Belgium star.

In today’s film news roundup, Noomi Rapace gets a starring role, ArcLight Cinemas hires Ted Mundorff and a “Karn Evil 9” movie is in the works.

Dino Dana: The Movie, the big-screen adaptation of Sinking Ship Entertainment's Emmy-winning TV series, is heading to the European Film Market in Berlin and has already landed several territory sales.Odin's Eye Entertainment has acquired worldwide sales rights outside of North America to the Telefilm-backed feature, selling to Japan (New Select) and South Korea (Yejilim) ahead of the market, where it will feature in Telefilms Perspective Canada screenings.The film will launch in North America

The Berlin Film Festival, which gets underway next week, is bracing itself for disruption to its 2020 edition as more than 50 Chinese delegates and a handful of international executives have canceled attendance due to the deadly coronavirus.