Nov 13, 2020
Berlinale Spotlight: World Cinema Fund in Its Third Year with ‟Around the World in 14 Films”

Update Nov 17, 2020:
Due to the current local COVID-19 situation and official regulations, the Berlinale Spotlight: World Cinema Fund in the scope of the "Around the World in 14 Films" festival cannot take place on December 6. As soon as an end to the lockdown is in sight - and with it the reopening of the cinemas -, a new date will be announced.

For many years now, the Berlinale has extended its presence beyond the festival season with specially curated programmes. These activities are known as Berlinale Spotlight.

Since 2018, the Berlinale World Cinema Fund (WCF) has been a guest at the Berlin film festival “Around the World in 14 Films” (December 3 to 12, 2020) with an annual Berlinale Spotlight. The presentation of the WCF films was very popular with the public in the previous two years.

On December 6, 2020, the time has come again: The Berlinale Spotlight will present five cinema productions funded by the WCF. In 2020, the focus will be on works by filmmakers from Argentina, Brazil, Lebanon, Myanmar and the Philippines:

The poetic, semi-documentary Girimunho (2011) by Helvécio Marins Jr. and Clarissa Campolina, filmed with amateur actors, comes from Brazil. In 2017, Zama, co-produced by Pedro Almodóvar, Danny Glover and Gael García Bernal and directed by the Argentine director Lucrecia Martel, celebrated its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival. The Valley by director Ghassan Salhab comes from Lebanon. The film was shown in the Forum of the Berlinale in 2015 and received five Lebanese film awards. Midi Z's award-winning refugee drama The Road to Mandalay comes from Myanmar. The documentary work Aswang by filmmaker Alyx Arumpac (Philippines) portrays a Manila that has deteriorated into a city of fear as a result of President Rodrigo Duterte's brutal anti-drug war. The Berlin premiere will take place in the presence of the director.

Vincenzo Bugno, head of the WCF, will present the Berlinale Spotlight at “Around the World in 14 Films”: “Films unfold with their audiences and cinemas serve as meeting places where we all share a cultural experience. We are particularly happy to be able to continue our wonderful collaboration with ‘Around the World in 14 Films’ and to show some important WCF films, especially now when the spaces for being together are very limited. We look forward to the passionate, motivated audience at this festival”.

Since 2004, the World Cinema Fund (WCF) has been committed to developing and funding cinema in regions with a weak film infrastructure, as well as to boosting cultural diversity in German and European cinemas:https://www.berlinale.de/en/world-cinema-fund/home/profile.html

“The globally recognisable tendency towards isolating oneself socially and culturally forms a stark contrast to the committed work of the World Cinema Fund. The funded films illustrate a world cinema that programmatically stands for artistic freedom and an open society”, say Susanne Bieger and Bernhard Karl, the festival directors of “Around the World in 14 Films”.

The independent Berlin film festival “Around the World in 14 Films” is expecting to take place with a physical presence, despite the current closure of the cinemas. The scheduled run is from December 3 to 12, 2020, at the cinema in the KulturBrauerei - and in compliance with the strictest hygiene regulations. Changes may nevertheless occur due to the pandemic.
Programme details and further information via: 14films.de

The World Cinema Fund is an initiative of the German Federal Cultural Foundation and the Berlin International Film Festival, in cooperation with the German Federal Foreign Office, with further support by the Goethe-Institut.
The special WCF Europe programme was launched with the support of the European Union’s Creative Europe MEDIA programme.
Thanks to additional funding from the German Federal Foreign Office, the special programme WCF Africa started in 2016.
The supplementary programme WCF ACP is financed by the European Union with the support of the Organisation of the African, Caribbean and Pacific States through the ACP-EU Culture Programme.

Press Office
November 13, 2020