#berlinale competition

[slow-cinema]

Season of the Devil (Ang Panahon ng Halimaw), dir Lav Diaz (2018)

[festivalists]

The Chinese dream

Still from Have a Nice Day's press conference in Berlin; credit: Berlinale

We cannot wrap this year's Berlinale coverage without looking into on one of the most epic happenings in the festival history – the inclusion of a Chinese title in the Main Competition section, and an animation one. Our insider Jia Xu talks to the person behind the industry success of HAVE A NICE DAY / HAO JI LE (2017) plus this year's Panorama gem GHOST IN THE MOUNTAINS / KONG SHAN YI KE (2017) – the young and aspiring producer / cinephile Yang Cheng!

I first met Yang Cheng at the 5th China Independent Film Festival in Nanjing, where we both were volunteers. It was the age of MSN, Olympics, and global financial crisis. Over the years, Yang wrote film reviews, organized screenings, took film projects to pitches like HAF and Golden Horse, and then attended a train of festivals with his steady productions. This time, he brought to Berlinale the animation feature HAVE A NICE DAY / HAO JI LE (2017) directed by Liu Jian. This film won appreciation from critics and programmers, and ranked #2 on the Screen jury grid, next to Aki Kaurismäki's THE OTHER SIDE OF HOPE / TOIVON TUOLLA PUOLEN (2017).

In this interview, Yang expresses his profound affection with the Berlinale and his opinion about filmmaking, about the Chinese society, as well as an ambitious plan for his newly founded production company NeZha Bros. Pictures. I believe he is one of the young filmmakers who are reshaping the Chinese film industry.

Jia Xu: What is your impression from Berlinale?

Yang Cheng: I like Berlinale quite a lot, and it is my third time here. I first came to Berlinale in 2013 as the producer of DON’T EXPECT PRAISES (2012). In 2014, I came to watch films as a guest reporter of a Chinese film magazine. This year, I am back with director Liu Jian’s film HAVE A NICE DAY. The festival is special. First, because the city of Berlin has both a rich history and young vibe, it is not so crowded, and there is a lot to explore. The festival’s wide selection of programmes and films means you have plenty options. And the cinemas are generally huge, so seeing a movie here is like attending a ritual, especially in the Berlinale Palast. Watching films like PARADISE: HOPE / PARADIES: HOFFNUNG (2013), NYMPHOMANIAC (2013), and BOYHOOD (2013) at the Berlinale is really unforgettable. To sit in the Palast and hear the audience’s laughter and applause when watching HAVE A NICE DAY feels special.

JX: What is your take about the Chinese society?

YC: It is chaotic but vigorous. A lot is going on.

JX: So will you emigrate?

YC: At the moment, no. I don’t have such a plan, but I would love to go exploring another culture, for example, to live in New York for half a year. There are cultural exchange programs that offer such opportunities. My friends like Pema Tseden and Liu Jian have taken the offer and went there, but at the present it is a pity that I don’t have that much free time to go. Back to the society question, China still has social mobility. It is still possible to change one’s social status.

JX: What would you say to younger filmmakers in such an environment?

YC: Try your best. Try your best till the end. But I think one has to be able to change his tracks at any time and don’t be exhausted by filmmaking, because filmmaking itself is not important. I think watching films is important, but making them is not. Many people say that the reason they make films is because they love films, but why? If you love movies, you go and watch it. I mean, you don’t have to make a film just because of that. What a joy to watch films! If you love movies, you can keep watching them, unless you find a direct and genuine connection between your life and moviemaking. When I first fell for film, I decided that I would like to be a director, so I wanted to make it to the Beijing Film Academy. I chose to apply for the Screenwriting Department instead of the Directing Department, because I thought that was a more approachable goal, but of course there are a number of directors who read Screenwriting at the BFA. When I arrived at BFA, I found people around me were merely talking about films and felt good about themselves just because they were BFA students. I didn’t want to be like them, and I thought to myself “Did I want to make movies out of my heartfelt passion, or out of blindness and vanity?” I also thought about whether I had something to say. And whether I needed to express what I wanted to say via filmmaking, a long and arduous process. What if I just write an article to express myself, or use Weibo. These are all ways of expression. Why make films when you can use other, much easier ways to express yourself? So I thought about what I could do with film, and what I wanted to do. I then met a few directors and found film production is what I am capable of and interested in, since I love films. More importantly, I thought to be a producer could help my character building, because at the time I was quite introverted and a bit depressed, to be honest. I found a need to open up and interact with people, and that is what requires of a producer. This would be difficult to me, but it shall be helpful for my personality. This decision was based on “a more genuine connection between life and film,” not vanity, so I think it is grounded and generates determination. All in all, I don’t think one needs to make a movie just because he likes watching movies. I detest the slogan hanging on BFA during freshmen recruitment: “This is where your dream begins.” I think, as an education institution, BFA should encourage people to lead a true life with reason. Filmmaking is just a job, a thing. Don’t glorify it so much. To younger filmmakers I’d say “Beware of those who always talk about dreams: they probably just want you to be a cheap labor, so they glorify a distant business plan.” I’ve seen too many big bosses in this business who would sugarcoat their manipulation and exploitation with so-called dreams: “Don’t only think about your salary. We are fighting for our dreams, and you are the future of the Chinese cinema.”

JX: So, do you have a dream?

YC: Sure. My dream is that everybody can live a happy life.

JX: You sound like Jesus Christ!

YC: [chuckles] The word “dream” is so grand that it should be something much bigger than daily pursuits. It should not be so trivial like to make more money or to make a better movie – these are just too small undertakings. It doesn’t have to be filmmaking or watching films. Besides film, there are so many beautiful and touching things to appreciate. You can always go back to reading.

JX: Could you talk about the directors that you are working with?

YC: I am open to any possible collaboration, and I don’t sign directors. I think lasting cooperation is based on similar ideals and beliefs, agreeable profit sharing and complementary proficiency. My current collaborators like director Liu Jian – he is quite a pure creator with one goal only: to make quality films. Also, his films always have originality. His films are not only special in China, but also look special in a global context. His film amazed festival audiences: “Oh, it is from China!” So different from regular festival movies from China. A director’s originality is what I value the most. I say to my collaborators that we have to make artistic contribution to China’s cinema, find new possibilities in the art form and style of cinema. Originality is quite high standard. Director Yang Heng’s films [GHOST IN THE MOUNTAINS / KONG SHAN YI KE (2017)] are also original both in terms of storytelling and art form. On one hand, his films are about the reality; on the other hand, they have surreal moments and very stylistic, too. He finds a good proportion between reality and what is beyond. So what I find most valuable in a director is not his / her theme or genre but originality. Also, continuous creativity is vital.

JX: Do you watch lots of movies nowadays?

YC: Not so much. I now actually watch much more bad movies than good ones, you know, the commercial films at the cinema. I have not found time to watch the much talked-about films like MANCHESTER BY THE SEA (2016) and MOONLIGHT (2016) yet. I will watch them for sure. But I have always had this idea that one does not have to watch too many movies, because the depth and the perspective of thinking about a movie matters more. If a movie evokes a resonance in you, it is much better than you watch 100 movies without feeling anything.

JX: So what are the movies you enjoy watching?

YC: I actually love COMRADES: ALMOST A LOVE STORY / TIAN MI MI (1996) and those made by Stephen Chow. In daily life, I often unconsciously think of PARADISE: HOPE. Films made by Michael Haneke. HOOLY BIBLE II (2016) made by Li Hongqi. ARRIVAL (2016), not a sci-fi film routine, I think it feels like THE BOURNE IDENTITY’s innovation in spy/agent movies. Larry Charles’s films never fail to make me laugh.

JX: And what is your plan for your company NeZha Bros?

YC: I plan to make small-budget films based on fun, original scripts in the next two or three years. After all, a company needs to make profit to ensure the creative flow.

If you are a film industry professional, you can watch titles from Berlinale Panorama, Berlinale Generation, Berlinale Forum & the previous work of directors selected at Berlinale Co-Production Market on Festival Scope

[festivalists]

The Berlinale side of hope

It is always very difficult to go over a monster of a festival like Berlinale right after the closing ceremony. Yet, Lydia Papadimitriou was so inspired by the fact that the films she managed to see and she liked picked a trophy in Berlin, her report was the first to land on our blog. Nachfreude mode on!

With the 67th  Berlinale’s awards just announced, it was both reassuring to find that my three top choices from this year’s edition were among the winners, and frustrating that I missed the Golden Bear winner, ON BODY AND SOUL / TESTRŐL ÉS LÉLEKRŐL (2017) by Hungarian Ildikó Enyedi. Despite the brevity of my visit in Berlin, I was however duly rewarded with a number of good films, especially ones focusing on rich, strong, mature, and surprising women – some of which were also directed by women. And, in this most explicitly political of festivals, it was fulfilling to see a range of issues from the environment, to the refugee crisis, to social inequalities being addressed in diverse, innovative, and often hopeful ways.

From the Competition films I watched, my top choice was Agnieszka Holland’s SPOOR / POKOT (2017) that won the Silver Bear Alfred Bauer Prize (the festival’s third award). The title of the veteran Polish director’s film refers to the animal tracks left near the bodies of murdered hunters in the rural region near the Polish-Czech border. A red herring as regards the murder mystery, the device nonetheless helps put across the environmental message of the feature. This is a multilayered work that combines various genres (crime thriller, black comedy, fairy tale, romance) but that also has a powerful political (environmental, feminist, anarchist) message. Impossible to sum up in 25 words or less, and therefore to easily fit it within simple, recognizable categories, it is the very antithesis of high concept. An optimistic if rather absurdist treat, SPOOR manages to maintain a fine balance between entertainment and activism.

The film stars Agnieszka Mandat as Duszejko, a rather eccentric retired civil engineer and astrology believer, who lives alone with her two dogs in southern Poland’s hunting region. When her dogs suddenly disappear, Duszejko’s desperate searches remain fruitless, yet soon, a series of dead bodies are discovered, all belonging to male hunters. Consistent evidence of “spoor” by the bodies suggests that animals were responsible for the killings. Despite its implausibility, we are gradually lured into suspending disbelief and believing Duszejko who passionately supports this theory. Feisty and confrontational in her encounters with those men who dismiss her love of animals, Duszejko is also open to romance – first with a Czech entomologist and later with her half-Polish, half-German neighbor. This is a very welcome and rare portrayal of a sexually active, desired and desiring, woman in her sixties.

Despite its occasional gruesome imagery, the film is also a visual treat, as the carefully controlled mobile camera offers both spectacular depictions of the landscape, and intriguingly draws our attention to particular aspects of the frame. Once the crime mystery is resolved – spoilers avoided – the semi-utopian ending adds to a welcome sense of warmth, affirmation, and hope. This is a film about respecting the other, the weaker, the invisible – but in boldly mixing the humorous detective story, the exciting eco-thriller and the feminist fairy tale, its welcome political messages are anything but didactic.

The festival’s second top award, the Silver Bear Grand Jury Prize, went to FÉLICITÉ (2017), another film focused on a strong female character that I found very rewarding. Directed by French-Senegalese Alain Gomis, performed by a magnetic newcomer, Congolese Véro Tshanda Beya, and shot on location in Kinshasa, the capital of Congo, FÉLICITÉ is a powerful example of new African cinema. This is a film of two parts. The first, suspenseful and frantic, shows single mother Félicité's attempts to raise the money necessary for her son to have a leg operation after a motorcycle accident. The second, more internalized and less action-driven, traces the gradual mellowing of the emotionally hardened woman. This is a story about survival and love. Firmly grounded in the realities of life in the African capital with its shabby buildings, dirty backstreets, and crowded hospitals – all of which give it a vivid documentary feel – the film also has a broader, mythical, and poetic dimension. This is underlined by the dream sequences and the use of music, especially the inserted, non-diegetic interludes of classical opera performed by the local symphonic orchestra. Sensual in its depiction of situations and feelings, the film offers rare cinematic insights to life in this part of sub-Saharan Africa, while also pointing to wider truths about love and acceptance.

Similar are the broader themes – if not the setting - of Aki Kaurismäki's second installment of his “refugee trilogy,” THE OTHER SIDE OF HOPE / TOIVON TUOLLA PUOLEN (2017) which deservingly won the Silver Bear for Best Direction. The film tells the story of a Syrian refugee who arrives in Finland seeking asylum, only to find himself ready to be deported. When he manages to escape from the authorities, he finds support from a shirt-salesman-turned-restaurant-owner, and strikes an understated friendship in an otherwise mostly hostile environment. Topical and urgent in its focus on institutional failures regarding the refugee crisis, on right-wing extremism, and on the importance of support and humanity, it is the combination of such a highly political content with the Finnish director’s inimitable deadpan and laconic comic melancholy style that makes the film so distinctive. Funny and touching, THE OTHER SIDE OF HOPE confirms Kaurismäki's continuing ability to surprise us in a familiar way.

Last but not least among my personal highlights from the 2017 edition of Berlinale was the Serbian REQUIEM FOR MRS J / REKVIJEM ZA GOSPODJU J. (2017) which screened as a Panorama Special. Starring Mirjana Karanović, the ex-Yugoslavia’s most exportable actress, and directed by Bojan Vuletić, this is another film focusing on a woman – this time a depressed widow who plans her suicide on the anniversary of her husband’s death. Hardly a topic for comedy, the feature nonetheless subtly brings to the surface situations and encounters that expose incongruences and absurdities that lead to laughter. While the opening scene of the widow cleaning her dead husband’s gun recalls the 1990s wars of Yugoslav secession, this is not a film about memory, guilt, or trauma (as most exportable films from the territory have tended to be). It is about regaining the will to live – and to sing – in a society that offers little hope. Its static camera, depressed color scheme, and the depiction of everyday social dysfunctions in a post-communist context are reminiscent of the Romanian New Wave. But the film’s comic touches and subtly surreal elements also recall Yugoslavia’s own Black Wave, albeit in a far more restrained manner. A co-production with Bulgaria, (Former Yugoslav Republic of) Macedonia, Russia and Eurimages, this is a work that signals the growing potential of Balkan / South Eastern European cinema. But most importantly, it also suggests that strong female characters and honestly exposed socio-political issues have the ability of keeping us in the right side of hope.

If you are a film industry professional, you can watch titles from Berlinale Panorama, Berlinale Generation, Berlinale Forum & the previous work of directors selected at Berlinale Co-Production Market on Festival Scope

[festivalists]

Who’s Cinema Berlinale – Day 7 / Yoana Pavlova

“Der Wim Wenders Film, den Wim Wenders nicht gemacht hat.”

[festivalists]

Critic’s Choice Berlinale - Day 10 / Joachim Kurz

Freedom of choice? Or choice of freedom? Sometimes, when you think about your own choices at festivals, every phrase with "freedom" in it sounds a little bit cynical. Because most of the time you have to see films not by choice but by a master plan. I always undertake the Berlinale Competition (because it appears quite reasonable for me, that one person focuses on one section) – and so I have to skip many films in the sidebars. Sometimes it is really hard: If you have to queue up early for FIFTY SHADES OF GREY (2014) and therefore cannot see a documentary about your favourite singer Nina Simone – WHAT HAPPENED, MISS SIMONE? (2015) by Liz Garbus. My dream? A festival (and yes, one of the big ones, please), where I do not have to work and only decide by cinematic passion. Will it come true?

[festivalists]

Critic’s Choice Berlinale - Day 9 / Greg de Cuir, Jr

You must never separate a film critic from his shoes, particularly at a film festival – particularly on the red carpet at a film festival. February 2015, Friedrichstadt-Palast, a screening of Peter Greenaway's EISENSTEIN IN GUANAJUATO (2014) in Competition at the Berlinale. Three years ago, I was at this same movie palace at the same film festival for a special screening of Eisenstein's revolutionary classic OCTOBER / OKTJABR (1927). Seeing that film on a huge screen with orchestral accompaniment was among the most powerful cinematic experiences I have ever had. I feel that Eisenstein's film is a masterpiece of avant-garde expression that should stand shoulder to shoulder with Dziga Vertov's MAN WITH A MOVIE CAMERA / CHELOVEK S KINOAPPARATOM (1929). Greenaway aspires to this lofty tradition of experimentation, which is maybe one reason I have always been interested in his films. The structuring motifs of his newest are shoes. Shining shoes, putting them on and taking them off again, vomiting on them, placing them under a pillow for safekeeping, dropping them off the roof of a grand theater not unlike my beloved Sergejstadt-Palast in Berlin.

[festivalists]

Critic’s Choice Berlinale - Day 6 / Tara Karajica

Very often critics are concentrated on watching and reviewing films at major film festivals, in a power play of who will submit their review first. However, some of us choose to indulge in an unattainable yet healthy dose of glamour at press conferences, during which futile topics are being tackled. Unfortunately, these press conferences show the true colors of the journalists and their interests. In the end, very few care about the critic's job, opinion, and choice. If you're not with the one you love, love the one you're with, they say. So, here, for a mere 30 minutes, I choose to love the journalistic vultures and the glamour, and I choose not to be a conscientious film critic and submit my review of Werner Herzog's QUEEN OF THE DESERT first.

[festivalists]

Critic’s Choice Berlinale - Day 5 / Yoana Pavlova

Let's start with the fact that I am not in Berlin right now, which does not mean I am not empathetic – it is only the fifth day of the festival, yet I am tired, frustrated, confused enough. Could you blame those who watch football on TV for not being emotionally involved? Only that in my case, just like in the case of thousands of other film journalists and critics who are not in Berlin, there is not any commentator. Instead, imagine a UEFA stadium where all spectators comment on the game simultaneously, with their own subjective point of view, speed, and language. Now imagine they do not watch a game but the world premiere of Terrence Malick's KNIGHT OF CUPS, whose opinion is to trust? And what if the Grammy or the BAFTA stadiums are very close by?

Yet, how come I am not in Berlin? Because I had to choose. Considering the location and the timing of the Holy Trinity in European festivals, the love-hate relationship between Cannes and Venice results into two equally southern events where vanity prevails, whereas programming decisions depend mostly on the wine list. Berlinale is a different case, a festival that embodies pretty much the amazing city where it takes place, as well as the political faults of those who repeat “Europe at two speeds” as a mantra. At the end, it seems, Berlinale turned into a festival at two speeds too – one that personifies, with German accurateness, everything that went wrong in today's film industry.

Then there are also other reasons. Tried to find some comfort in the most recent Criticwire Survey Do You Trust Film Festival Buzz?, just to realize that instead of answering the question, participants rather rationalize their choices to attend / not to attend certain festivals. Fathers who are needed at home, bohemians who had nowhere else to sleep, the festivalgoer-next-door type – it is heartwarming to know we are all in this together (“wild cats everywhere”)...

Leaving the buzz aside, which one is the Berlinale film I would watch right now if I could? FLOTEL EUROPA, as I tend to side with the lower EU class (my passport says I belong there anyway) and be sentimental about the 1990s, when the East and the West felt good about themselves, and politics was no place for gaming gurus. I bet that if you look at the list of Golden Bear winners from the 1990s, you would feel nostalgic too: Ang Lee's THE WEDDING BANQUET / XI YAN - 1993, Jim Sheridan's IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER – 1994, Miloš Forman's THE PEOPLE VS. LARRY FLYNT - 1997, Walter Salles' CENTRAL STATION / CENTRAL DO BRASIL – 1998, Terrence Malick's THE THIN RED LINE – 1999. Yes, it was that long ago.