internationale filmfestspiele

62.ma edizione

 

Berlino 09 / 19 febbraio 2012

 

Berlinale Competition Now Complete

see the whole Competition here

With Wang Quan’an’s Bai lu yuan (White Deer Plain) from the People’s Republic of China, the Competition of the 62nd Berlin International Film Festival is now complete. 18 films will be vying for the Golden and Silver Bears in the Berlinale Palast. A total of 23 films will be showing in the Competition programme. There will also be two special screenings in the Berlinale Palast.

Bai lu yuan (White Deer Plain)
People’s Republic of China
by Wang Quan'an
with Zhang Fengyi, Zhang Yuqi, Wu Gang
World premiere

Starting signal for the new Berlinale initiative Berlinale Residency

The Berlinale is expanding its portfolio with an additional initiative and extending a four-month invitation to six filmmakers and their new projects to the creative metropolis of Berlin in autumn 2012. The new international fellowship programme, Berlinale Residency, will help filmmakers to complete their scripts successfully, as well as to develop the audience potential of the films together with their producers in a “Script to Market” seminar. Working in close contact with individually selected mentors from the Nipkow Programm and international market experts, the filmmakers can take a decisive step toward placing their next film project on the way to a successful theatrical release. Directors who have already celebrated a feature film success at a renowned international film festival can apply for the four-month Berlinale Residency.

“The Berlinale Residency is a logical progression of the previous Berlinale initiatives,” explains Festival Director Dieter Kosslick. “The fellowship serves as a follow-up project for filmmakers who already had a feature in the official programme of the festival, who were selected with projects in the Berlinale Co-Production Market or Berlinale Talent Campus, or who were supported through the World Cinema Fund. However, we are also looking forward to receiving other filmmakers from around the world, whom the programme will entice to Berlin.”

Kirsten Niehuus, Managing Director of film funding at the Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg said: “We were particularly impressed that the Berlinale Residency not only practises traditional story development, but also works on the projects in close relationship to the market and with corresponding experts from the industry. Audience orientation and effective analysis are more important today than ever before.”

The first call for entries for the Berlinale Residency, which will begin in September 2012, starts at the opening of the Berlinale on February 9, 2012 online at www.berlinale-residency.de.

The six selected projects (feature and documentary films and cross-media projects) will be worked on from September to December. Afterwards, they will be presented, in order to find additional partners for financing and - where appropriate - co-production. On offer as initial presentation platforms are the Berlinale Co-Production Market and the Guadalajara International Film Festival, which takes place in March and along with its affiliated Film Market is a partner of the Berlinale Residency. Depending on the project, further presentations at co-production markets in Buenos Aires, Durban or Sarajevo are being considered.

The Berlinale Residency is an initiative of the Berlin International Film Festival, a division of the Kulturveranstaltungen des Bundes in Berlin GmbH, the Nipkow Programm and the Guadalajara International Film Festival, in co-operation with the MEDIA Mundus Programme of the European Union and the Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg.

Retrospective “The Red Dream Factory”: Events, Silent Film Musicians and a Publication

The Retrospective “The Red Dream Factory” is the outcome of years of systematic research. It will present 44 films in 32 screenings - including rarities of whose condition little was known until recently. New prints of some of the films are being made available for the Retrospective by several archives: the German Federal Archives/Film Archives Department, the Deutsche Kinemathek, the Austrian Film Museum and the Russian State Documentary Film and Photo Archive in Krasnogorsk. In cooperation with the Deutsche Kinemathek, the Austrian Film Museum will be presenting a new restoration of Fyodor Otsep’s adaptation of the Tolstoy drama Zhivoy trup (The Living Corpse, 1929) that is based on six different versions.

Internationally renowned musicians will be providing accompaniment for the many silent films in the Retrospective programme. Dutch silent film pianist and composer Maud Nelissen and British accompanist Stephen Horne have performed at previous Retrospectives. Canadian Gabriel Thibaudeau, who is in great demand as a composer, conductor and pianist, will be accompanying silent films at the Berlinale for the first time. Eunice Martins is well known to Berliners as the resident pianist of the Arsenal cinema, and to international audiences from many festivals.
 

The Retrospective film programme will be supplemented by a series of events at the Deutsche Kinemathek. This year’s theme will open with a talk moderated by Rainer Rother, head of the Retrospective, with curators Günter Agde and Alexander Schwarz. Alexander Schwarz will also be presenting his new documentary Die rote Traumfabrik, before it premieres on television, with Nina Goslar, who is responsible for the film at ARTE. Adelheid Heftberger, curator of the Vertov Collection of the Austrian Film Museum, will speak about the eventful history of Dziga Vertov’s only work for the “Red Dream Factory”, the often re-cut film Tri Pesni O Lenine (Three Songs of Lenin). Two special events have been organized to give insight into the work of the Deutsche Kinemathek and are related to Studio Babelsberg’s 100th anniversary. For the complete programme of events go to: www.berlinale.de.

The extensive publication “Die rote Traumfabrik. Meschrabpom-Film und Prometheus 1921-1936”, which Bertz + Fischer are publishing for the Berlinale, provides further material about the Retrospective. As the first monograph in German about this legendary German-Russian cinematic experiment, the book, edited by Günter Agde and Alexander Schwarz, compiles essays by Russian and German authors on the history and aesthetics of the films. These essays are supplemented by historical documents, previously unpublished photos, contemporary avant-garde film posters, and a complete filmography.

Berlinale Camera for Ray Dolby

Since 1986, the Berlin International Film Festival has presented the Berlinale Camera to film personalities or institutions to which it feels particularly indebted and wishes to express its thanks.

At the 62nd Berlin International Film Festival, Ray Dolby will be awarded the Berlinale Camera in recognition of his work as one of the most important engineers and inventors in the film industry.

Ray Dolby revolutionised sound in cinemas and contributed greatly to making films the amazing acoustic experience we know today. By installing multiple loudspeakers and applying multi-channel technology, Dolby surround sound introduced viewers to the feeling of being fully immersed in the moment. Ray Dolby’s first surround sound technology, Dolby Stereo introduced in 1975, was quickly adopted by movie theatres worldwide, as films like Star Wars (1977; directed by George Lucas) and Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977; directed by Steven Spielberg) were released in the new Dolby sound format. Dolby Digital surround sound followed, which also later became the standard for home cinema audio with the introduction of DVD. Ray Dolby founded Dolby Laboratories in 1965 based on a simple idea that came to him as a way of solving the issues around the hissing sound on audio tape. This was the birth of Dolby A-type noise reduction for the professional recording market, followed three years later by Dolby B-type noise reduction for consumer products. In the 1970s, Ray Dolby turned the company’s attention to cinema, transforming the entertainment experience for ever. In 1989 his work in the field was recognised with an Oscar for his contributions to the film industry; and in 2003, an Emmy Lifetime Achievement Award. Ray Dolby served as a member of Dolby’s Board of Directors from 1965 until his retirement from the Board in 2011, although he remains Director Emeritus, while his son David Dolby has been involved in the management of Dolby Laboratories for a number of years, and since 2011 has been a member of the Board of Directors.

The Berlinale will present Ray Dolby with the Berlinale Camera on February 16, 2012.

Since 2004, the Berlinale Camera has been sponsored by the Düsseldorf-based goldsmith Georg Hornemann. The trophy was redesigned for the Berlinale in 2008. Modelled on a real camera, it now has 128 components. From swivel head to tripod it has been crafted and assembled with great artistry, and many of its silver and titanium parts are movable.

Crossmedia Distribution in Focus: European Film Market to host industry panel with Film- und Medienstiftung NRW

“Distribution in a Crossmedia World” will be the title of a new panel discussion presented by the European Film Market together with Film- und Medienstiftung NRW and in collaboration with the trade magazine Blickpunkt:Film. On Monday 13 February 2012 at 16:30 in the Gropius Mirror Restaurant (across from the Martin-Gropius-Bau), international industry experts will discuss innovations and current developments in digital distribution.

The Danish film producer Peter Aalbæck Jensen (Zentropa, i.e. Melancholia), YouTube Content Creators Manager Christoph Poropatits (Ireland) and the media lawyer Dr. Christoph Wagner (Hogan Lovells International, LLP, Berlin) will shed light on the current crossmedia landscape and debate new perspectives on the distribution of film and moving image content. Marek Walton, co-founder of The Mustard Corporation (UK) and international expert and consultant in crossmedia storytelling, will chair the event.
 

New digital platforms are bringing radical changes to the distribution and consumption of film. Ongoing digitalization is changing not only the production end of the spectrum, but also the distribution channels, consumer patterns and marketing opportunities of film and media content. Alongside cinema and television, new web platforms are increasingly taking hold, offering films on PCs, tablets, smartphones and soon also on Internet TV. These new digital distribution channels are paving the way for a fundamental shift in the film market and the opportunities for crossmedia distribution. For distributors, content owners and consumers they offer optimistic prospects but also bring with them certain risks.

What consequences will these developments have for producers and distributors? What is changing legally with regard to the exploitation of rights and marketing? How are these new platforms developing and with what strategies do they reach out to their customers?

Entrance to the Crossmedia Debate is free for registered EFM participants and accredited Festival guests and/or at advance registration to kongress@filmstiftung.de

SITO UFFICIALE

 

62.mo internationale filmfestspiele

Berlino 09 / 19 febbraio 2012