In this blog some of the ICO team highlight their favourite titles from this year’s 73rd annual Berlinale, including impressive debuts, stirring dramas, and some powerful coming of age titles.
Isabel Moir, Film Programmer
Passages (dir. Ira Sachs)
After hearing rave reviews from Sundance earlier this year, I was very keen to catch this one at the Berlinale. In the end, I was lucky enough to attend a screening with stars Ben Whishaw, Franz Rogowski and director Ira Sachs present at the beautiful Zoo Palast cinema which certainly enhanced the experience. Set in Paris, Passages is an unflinching and at times brutal portrait of a marriage breaking down between Tomas and Martin (Rogowski, Whishaw), after Tomas has an affair with Agathe (played by Adele Exarchopoulos). What ensues is a complicated love triangle which intimately explores the power dynamics between these three protagonists as they navigate the blurred situation they have found themselves in. It would be easy to view Tomas as a narcissist and deeply unlikeable person, but Sachs’ approach brings a lot more nuance than that to Rogowski’s charismatic performance. Tomas’ demanding presence makes for a compelling watch, as do all his statement outfits (including mesh clothing and crop tops), which helps viewers understand why Martin and Agathe would be drawn to his selfishness. The chemistry between the three leads is at the centre of the film which dives deep into the messiness of relationships and learning when’s the right time to let go of someone.
Passages will be distributed by MUBI in the UK, the release date is still to be confirmed.
Totem (dir. Lila Avilés)
Screened in this year’s competition, Lila Avilés’ second feature, Totem, is a semi-biographical ensemble drama seen through the eyes of a seven year old child named Sol (Naíma Sentíes). Avilés’ directorial debut was the festival hit The Chambermaid in 2018, which was distributed by New Wave in the UK. New Wave has now also acquired the UK rights to Totem, which cements this relationship further. The beginning of the film sees Sol and her mother driving to a surprise party. During the journey, they playfully compete by holding their breath through the long tunnels, leading Sol to confess that she wished for her father not to die. It soon becomes clear that the surprise party is for Sol’s father’s birthday, who is being cared for at his family home, but it’s also acting as a farewell party too. The film takes place over one day, observing the various family members as they prepare for the party and letting go of a beloved family member. The characters feel so richly drawn and lived in, featuring tender performances from the cast which sees Avilés reteam with actor Teresa Sanchez (The Chambermaid). Totem’s script beautifully observes the relationships within this fractured family unit, showing how tragic circumstances can bring out the best and worst in all of them. Managing to be both incredibly moving as well as very funny, Avilés observes the chaos and dynamics at play as the family struggle with grief, coming to terms with the heartbreaking changes coming for all those involved.
New Wave will distribute this film in the UK, the release date is still to be confirmed.
Heather McIntosh, Film Programmer
The Last Picture Show (dir. Peter Bogdanovich)
Film festivals’ retrospective strands always excite me because it feels like such a privilege to be able to get your first watch of an old film on the big screen, so I was super excited to see Peter Bogdanovich’s The Last Picture Show in the Berlinale line-up, as it had been on my to-watch list for years.
I’d heard that there was a deep melancholy that ran through this coming-of-age drama but I wasn’t fully prepared for what a truly feel-bad film this is. I don’t mean this negatively by the way, miserable cinema is my jam. It is remarkably astute in its examination of loneliness and feeling lost — and there are numerous moments of deep and moving humanity conveyed in the film’s incredible performances — but man, it hurts.
In this portrait of a small Texas town, bored teenagers are bidding farewell to their youth and looking for a way out of the ghost town they inhabit. There are many ways the film feels timeless in the way it’s able to capture the old and the new simultaneously, from its numerous references to Old Hollywood in a film that has become so emblematic of the ‘New Hollywood’ movement, to the film’s examination of the stark divide between generations in the town. There’s a scene I particularly love where ‘Sam The Lion’, played by Ben Johnson, takes the boys fishing and speaks about old times, nostalgically recalling a past and lost love. The generational divide is also looked at through Sonny’s affair with his coach’s wife, Ruth, as they embark on a doomed romance. I found her character the most heart-breaking of all, as her loneliness is so raw and palpable.
It is truly a masterwork of human discontent. The town itself becomes a heavy and suffocating presence, its pervasive emptiness running thick through every scene. All roads lead to nowhere.
Bookings through Park Circus.
Mikaela Smith, Film Programmer
Past Lives (dir. Celine Song)
A friend told me that you haven’t really done Berlinale if you don’t have to have a little cry in the toilet at some point. Well, Past Lives gave me my Berlinale toilet tears, plus some bonus cinema screen tears, and in-the-corner-of-a-café-scarfing-down-a-chicken-salad tears.
Needless to say I found it to be remarkably affecting and an incredibly accomplished debut from Celine Song. Starring Greta Lee (Russian Doll) it follows Nora, who emigrated from South Korea to Canada as a child — losing touch with her childhood best friend in the process — and then to New York as an adult. Somehow, all those years later, she reconnects with her old friend. He is still in South Korea, still thinking about her, and wondering what could have been. What follows is a deeply felt romance, but not as you might imagine, taking the soft route and posing questions that can’t be answered; quiet musings on the lives we leave behind and the roads we choose to take chances on. One of the most assured and intelligent scripts I’ve seen brought to life in a very long time, it had me wandering the streets of Berlin in a daze.
Past Lives has been acquired for UK distribution by STUDIOCANAL and is currently set for release later this year.
Mutt (dir. Vuk Lungulov-Klotz)
Another remarkably gentle film, Mutt is a delicate slice-of-life drama following 24-hours in New York with Feña, a recently transitioned man, as he navigates day-to-day challenges. A simple premise, the joy of Mutt is in its sensitive handling of human relationships and richly textured performances from its largely newcomer cast. Intimately exploring three relationships — a chance run-in with a pre-transition ex-boyfriend, a surprise visit from a younger sister and a trip to pick up his visiting father from the airport — Mutt authentically navigates life’s grey areas and how we hurt and heal one another. Also a debut feature, Mutt is comfortable in it’s authenticity, directed by Vuk Lungulov-Klotz and starring Lio Mehiel, it carries a striking empathy for all of its characters that evidently comes from lived experience, and is all the better for it.
Mutt is currently without a UK distributor.
Jake Abatan, Marketing and Administrative Coordinator
Inside (dir. Vasilis Katsoupis) & #Manhole (dir. Kazuyoshi Kumakiri)
At this year’s Berlinale, by pure accident I experienced a bizarre but powerful double-bill: Inside, which follows Willem Defoe as an art thief who becomes trapped mid-heist in a luxurious but rather inhospitable penthouse suite; and #Manhole, a markedly less serious film concerning a Japanese young professional’s attempts to liberate himself from a manhole he has drunkenly fallen into. Both films deal with men pushed to their physical and mental limits under confinement, but their tone couldn’t be more different.
Inside, which screened as part of the festival’s Panorama strand, contemplates art’s value in times of struggle. Finding himself in a lush, modernist penthouse, Willem Defoe’s thief finds time and again that the extravagant furnishings, though pretty, are remarkably bad at doing what they’re meant to. The fridge, to take one example, has little that is edible, but excels at belting out the Macarena if left open for too long. Willem Defoe gives an excellent showcase of his acting talents, with his attempts at survival beginning to take the form of a strange performance art piece. As you can imagine, Inside plays out with a grossly elevated, but utterly compelling, tone.
#Manhole, on the other hand, finds its tone firmly in the gutter. The less said about the plot, the better, as much of the fun comes from discovering just how far the film can run with this barebones, and frankly absurd, concept. One thing I will spill is that the # in the title refers to the predicament our protagonist finds himself in going viral, mobilising an army of keyboard warriors, online streamers, and zealous vigilanties to come to his aid. The conclusions they come to, and the ways in which they try to to save the day, are both hilarious and terrifying, which goes some way towards describing this excellent genre film that I hope more UK audiences can discover.
Universal will distribute Inside in the UK, with the release date still to be confirmed. At the time of writing #Manhole has no UK release date.
Art College 1994 (dir. Liu Jian)
True to its title, Art College 1994 follows a loose group of art school students in China 1994, ready to graduate but still unsure on their place in the world – both as artists and young adults. Amongst this group of strong willed, but quietly bewildered students, two stand out: the edgy, Nirvana loving, Xiaojun (Dong Zijian) who, out of step with his grungy persona, studies traditional Chinese painting; and his best friend Zhifei, a more easy-going spirit with much less idealistic attitudes to art and life.
Somewhat evoking the days of directionless youth – and rather impressively for an animation – the filmmaking is relatively free and formless, with the characters given plenty of time and space to speak their mind. One critic has described the animation as reminiscent of Beavis and Butt-Head, which goes a long way to describe the aesthetics but doesn’t quite do justice to just how beautiful the film is to look at. So beautiful in fact, that I often found my eye wandering up from the rich subtitled dialogue, to gaze in awe at the images. There are also bold nods to the cultural shifts China underwent in the 90s, which admittedly went over my head for the most part. But even without that context, I found Art College 1994 to be an absolutely stunning coming of age tale which I can’t wait to revisit.
At the time of writing Art College 1994 has no UK release date.
Berlinale have confirmed that the 74th edition of the festival will take place February 15-25, 2024.