72nd Berlin International Film Festival

At the Berlinale, too, the motto was: Vaccination protects!

There were no guarantees, especially since the political landscape – which would have a decisive say over the further course of Covid-19 policies – had changed in September. The Merkel years in Germany had come to an end, the social-democratic party SPD with Olaf Scholz as the new chancellor now headed a coalition with the green party and the liberal party. In addition to the resulting reorganisation of the Chancellery and its state ministers, the cards were also reshuffled at the federal state level. In early December, the position of Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media, whose ministry provides the lion’s share of the Berlinale’s budget, was filled by Claudia Roth. Franziska Giffey became the new Governing Mayor of Berlin and thus responsible for the restructuring of the Covid-19 regulations.

Quo vadis, Berlinale?

The festival directors were faced with a complex situation that involved many new players, and had to consider and balance different, sometimes conflicting interests and requirements. On the one hand, at the end of December nobody could guarantee that a festival due to take place in February would not have to be cancelled at short notice. On the other, an in-person Berlinale would send an important and strong signal to the cinema sector which had suffered massively from the restrictions for almost two years. Nobody wanted to risk a super-spreader event but, conversely, there were clear signs from filmmakers, producers and distributors that they really wanted to present their films in front of an audience and also that the audience itself was longing for a true festival experience.

Something tangible: the Berlinale should take place in a physical form decided Carlo Chatrian and Mariette Rissenbeek

For the director duo, however, such considerations were never a viable alternative. As Mariette Rissenbeek emphasised in an interview in late January: “There will be no online version. The films we have selected cannot simply go online [...]. These films need a physical presence in order to be promoted and to be presented to the audience. That’s why they are actually looking for a festival” (in an interview with Peter Zander, “Berliner Morgenpost”, January 27, 2022).

The 2022 Festival Format

And so, on January 12, the final decision about the 2022 format was eventually announced: the Berlinale would take place as an in-person event, albeit with a 50 percent reduction in capacity at the venues and in adherence to strict hygiene regulations. The number of days featuring premieres with international guests was reduced to seven and the programme capped at “only” 256 feature-length and short films. The official Award Ceremony was scheduled for Wednesday; from the second Thursday onwards, the “Publikumstag” (“audience day”) – traditionally held on the festival’s final Sunday to present repeat screenings without the attendance of film casts and crews – would be extended to four days. Parties and receptions were suspended by the festival to avoid crowds and minimise contacts. As in the previous year, the European Film Market with the Berlinale Co-Production Market, as well as Berlinale Talents and the World Cinema Fund Day, would take place in digital form only.

Carlo Chatrian, Artistic Director of the Berlin International Film Festival

Carlo Chatrian followed up in a very open and honest text entitled “Exercises in Resistance” in which he very clearly defined the function and mission of the Berlinale: “Films at a festival are shared in a space that belongs to nobody. You access it by agreeing to rules that cannot be waived. To take part in a festival means sharing an experience with other people who often have different tastes, backgrounds and cultural leanings. Seeing a film with other people at a social venue is an exercise in openness and humility – one we believe to be essential nowadays.” The Berlinale thus clearly positioned itself as the protagonist and preserver of a cinema culture that is defined not only by a certain aesthetic but also by a specific kind of architecture and sense of community.

The casts and crews were delighted by the opportunity to attend the premieres of their films in Berlin and were ultimately welcomed in large numbers during the festival. The incidence rates were continuously assessed up to the opening of the 72nd Berlinale. The festival management directors confirmed time and again that the decision for an in-person festival would remain unchanged. Hygiene policies were drawn up and adapted in close collaboration with the health authorities – and in the end were more restrictive than for cinema screenings outside of the festival.

Claudia Roth, Minister of State for Culture and the Media

Ticketing for accredited persons was processed online for the first time, partly as a way to avoid crowds – an urgently required precaution given the infection rates. On the day of the Berlinale programme press conference on January 19, the number of reported cases in Germany surpassed the 100,000 mark for the first time, with the peak of the spread of the Oomicron variant predicted for mid-February, exactly coinciding with the dates of the festival. The Berlinale found a great ally in the new Minister of State for Culture and the Media who advocated making the desire for an in-person festival a reality: “We want the festival to send a signal to the entire film industry, to cinemas and moviegoers and to culture as a whole. We need cinema, we need culture,” she insisted (“RedaktionsNetzwerk Deutschland”, February 12, 2022) and gave an impassioned and inspiring speech in support of cinema and culture at the Opening Ceremony on February 10 in the Berlinale Palast.

Let the Games Begin!

Thus, the 72nd Berlin International Film Festival got underway. An edition that should go down in history as one of the most memorable. The atmosphere on Potsdamer Platz took some getting used to, and not only for die-hard fans; the hustle and bustle around the Red Carpet was reduced to a minimum.

The Red Carpet is rolled out for the in-person festival

Since public ticket sales also took place exclusively online and the Potsdamer Platz Arkaden were still being renovated, there was no central meeting point for all the festival fans – also due to the Covid-19 protection policy. Jonathan Romney felt transported back to the time before 1989: “All this made the unusually quiet Palast area feel like an art installation tribute to the bygone days of Checkpoint Charlie” (“The Guardian”, February 19, 2022). Describing the edition as “strange”, his assessment was similar to the one by his German colleague Moritz Holfelder: “It was a strange Berlinale. [...] That which otherwise makes the film festival so special, meeting friends and colleagues from all over the world for a chat shortly before or after the screenings, was missing [...] this time. And when you exited the cinema in the evening and stepped onto the deserted Potsdamer Platz, you sometimes felt like you were in a ghost town [...]. At times it seemed as if the heart of the Berlinale had been ripped out” (“br24.de”, February 17, 2022). This once again affirmed that the Berlinale is more than the sum of the works on display: encounters and exchanges, the hustle and bustle of the festival – all this is not just an accessory but the beating heart of the event.

Covid-19 remained ubiquitous during the festival. The requirement to wear face masks, daily tests and the checkerboard pattern in which audiences were seated in the cinemas pervaded the experience. The influence of the virus was felt most clearly at the presentation of the Honorary Golden Bear to Isabelle Huppert: the day before the ceremony, the actor tested positive and was unable to travel. This did not detract from the celebrations, however. The award winner was connected via video link to the Berlinale Palast and was able to follow the very personal speech honouring her, given by her colleague Lars Eidinger, live. In this format, her charisma had an absolutely magical effect on the enthusiastic audience.

Ulrich Ziemons and Ala Younis, the two co-heads of Forum Expanded

The new section heads of Forum Expanded, Ala Younis and Ulrich Ziemons, also discussed in detail in an interview the influence of the virus on both the works themselves and the work of the curators (Younis and Ziemons had already taken over from Stefanie Schulte Strathaus, one of the founders of the section, in August 2021). At Berlinale Series, the pandemic had an indirect impact on the works, as section head Julia Fidel explained: “I think there is a little less experimentation but a lot of really strong, classic storytelling. Creators are building themselves a certain framework, say within detective or hospital shows, and then pushing those boundaries” (in an interview with Aaron Rottenberg, “list23”, January 31, 2022).

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Still from Alcarràs by Carla Simón

An Evening of Women

Even if there was some ambivalence, everyone agreed on one thing about the decisions of the International Jury: the night belonged to the women. A fact that was particularly highlighted when, with Alcarràs, Carla Simón, working with her producer María Zamora, became the third female director in a row to win the main prize at one of the major European festivals (after Julia Ducournau with Titane at Cannes and Audrey Diwan with L’événement at Venice). At a time when the proportion of women in all areas was being viewed with scepticism, the 72nd Berlinale was fully convincing: with Natalia López Gallardo (Jury Prize), Claire Denis (Best Director), Meltem Kaptan (Best Leading Performance), Laura Basuki (Best Supporting Performance) and Laila Stieler (Best Screenplay), women won awards in six of the eight categories. The Silver Bear for Outstanding Artistic Contribution went to Rithy Panh and his collaborator Sarit Mang while Hong Sangsoo was awarded the Grand Jury Prize. And all this from an International Jury under the presidency of M. Night Shyamalan in which the gender distribution was almost equal.

Kurdwin Ayub and Ulrich Seidl: the director and the producer of Sonne

As Jessica Kiang wrote: “But for all its sunshine and sad, brave wisdom, ‘Alcarràs’ was, for me, outmatched by a much wintrier competition title. Ulrich Seidl’s ‘Rimini’ is an uncompromising, coldly provocative drama that gathered no prizes, which is a shame. But that its star, Michael Thomas, playing a washed-up club singer in an off-season Italian beach town, was not specifically recognized is more or less a crime” (“The New York Times”, February 17, 2022). Ulrich Seidl could at least console himself with the fact that Kurdwin Ayub’s Sonne, which he produced, won the GWFF Best First Feature Award.

A Future with Uncertainties

The 72nd Berlinale ended with relief, cautious joy and a lot of hope and fear when looking towards the future. With 156,000 tickets sold, it could certainly be considered a success in view of the reduced seating capacity and, for many, the joy about finally being able to watch films in the cinema again and take in the festival atmosphere was the predominant emotion. Jessica Kiang, for example, summed it up like this: “The category error from complainants is to compare this reduced-attendance edition with Before Times Berlinales. The real comparison is with last year’s online version, which debuted a stronger selection of films but didn’t feel like a festival at all. Consider that lonely experience as the alternative and the staircases, seating hassles and swabbing become a small price to pay” (“The New York Times”, February 17, 2022). Anke Sterneborg added in her text on “rbb24.de”: “What else remains of this festival? The courage or daring of Carlo Chatrian and Mariette Rissenbeek to wrest an in-person festival from the virus. It did not turn out to be a super-spreading event, as some had feared, but a strong signal for cinema and culture, as others had hoped. A Berlinale in an exceptional state, the great fortune to be able to see films in the cinemas with guests on the stage and audiences in the seats – this is what many filmmakers were extremely enthusiastic about these past few days” (February 21, 2022).

Linda Söffker (Perspektive Deutsches Kino) and Maryanne Redpath (Generation)

The decoupling of the festival from the European Film Market was also striking. While one side suffered greatly from the restrictions, for the other, it was an opportunity to venture into new dimensions: “The downbeat feel at the Berlin festival this year contrasted with the optimism and bustling business of Berlin’s European Film Market [...]” (Scott Roxborough, “The Hollywood Reporter”, February 16, 2022).
There were some special farewells at the end of the festival: for both Linda Söffker in Perspektive Deutsches Kino and Maryanne Redpath in Generation, the 72nd Berlinale was their last edition as section heads.