Every year in February, Germany’s capital becomes host to one of the world’s great international film festivals, the Berlinale. The festival has been running since 1951, the dawn of the Cold War, as a “showcase of the free world,” and its evolution through Berlin’s divided history has shaped it into a platform uniquely qualified to discover social issues through the lens of film. Considered, according to its website, to be “the most political of all major film festivals,” the Berlinale is a great place for cinephiles in this very international city to get a glimpse of the rawest, edgiest, most progressive films of the moment, from around the world. But this year, quite a few of those films happen to come by way of France. Nine of the twenty films in competition for the Golden Bear for Best Film are French productions or co-productions. And that’s not even counting the festival’s many other sections.
While the competition winner receives the Golden Bear for Best Film, a variety of “Silver Bears” are given out for distinctions such as Best Director, Best Screenplay, or the Grand Jury Prize.
In addition to the competition titles, the festival’s other sections include the Berlinale Special & Berlinale Series (for the “extraordinary and glamorous”), Encounters (for the “aesthetically and structurally daring”), Panorama (for the “sexy, edgy, and daring”), and Generation (for young filmmakers). Around 400 films are shown each year, ranging from feature films, to documentaries, to more experimental works. This year, the festival will take place from February 10-20. The program has been released just this week, and tickets will be made available for purchase three days prior to each showing. So, if you’re in town, and looking to catch some of these hot new productions, you’d be smart to keep an eye on ticket releases to secure yours.
Here are some of the most exciting French films coming to the Berlinale this month.
Both Sides of the Blade (Avec amour et acharnement)
Category: Competition
Directed by Claire Denis and starring Juliette Binoche, Vincent Lindon, Grégoire Colin, Issa Perica, and Bulle Ogier, Both Sides of the Blade follows the unraveling of three lives. When a woman (Binoche) runs into an old flame (Colin), the two spark up their affair. Things become more complicated when the woman’s husband (Lindon) re-enters a professional relationship with his wife’s fling, an old friend from his past. Denis, known for directing films such as Beau Travail (1999), is a fan favorite, and her new film is highly anticipated by true scholars of French cinema.
Tickets can be purchased here.
La Ligne
Category: Competition
La Ligne, directed by Franco-Swiss director Ursula Meier and co-written by Meier and leading actress Stéphanie Blanchoud, follows the aftermath of a family dispute between a 35-year-old woman (Blanchoud), and her mother. After being served with a restraining order, Blanchoud’s character makes a daily pilgrimage to the titular line that separates her from her family, 200 meters from her mother’s front door. The film also stars Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, Elli Spagnolo, Dali Benssalah, and India Hair, and is a Swiss, French, and Belgian co-production.
Tickets can be purchased here.
The Passengers of the Night (Les passagers de la nuit)
Category: Competition
This “nostalgic saga of self-invention” conflates the social and political optimism of 1980s France with one woman’s very personal quest to improve the world in whichever small ways she can. The Passengers of the Night stars Charlotte Gainsbourg alongside Quito Rayon-Richter, Noée Abita, Megan Northam, and Thibault Vinçon, in this touching film from director Mikhaël Hers.
Tickets can be purchased here.
Peter von Kant
Category: Competition
Peter von Kant, loosely based on Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s 1972 film “Die bitteren Tränen der Petra von Kant” (“The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant”), will open the Berlinale on February 10 at the Berlinale Palast. This is director François Ozon’s sixth time in competition at the festival, and will star Denis Ménochet as the titular character, alongside Isabelle Adjani, Khalil Gharbia, Hanna Schygulla, and Stéfan Crépon. A satirical comedy that is both commentary and meta-commentary on the original film’s themes as well as its creation, Peter von Kant follows a successful film director’s chaotic relationship and mentorship of a much younger man.
Tickets can be purchased here.
Allons enfants
Category: Rookies
Look, there’s a reason why the high school dance film genre has endured this long. It never fails to entertain. Allons enfants takes the trope to an elite high school in Paris, where students from different backgrounds are taught hip-hop dancing as they struggle to pass le bac. From newcomers Thierry Demaizière and Alban Teurlai.
Tickets can be purchased here.
Europe
Category: Forum
Philip Scheffner, better known as a documentary director, has ventured into the world of fiction with the highly visual and enigmatic Europe. An Algerian woman (played by Rhim Ibrir), gets a medical residency permit in a small town in southwestern France, but is turned away after she has recovered, and forced to return home.
Tickets can be purchased here.
Incredible but True (Incroyable mais vrai)
Category: Berlinale Special Gala
Directed by the eccentric Quentin Dupieux, Incredible but True is a wacky, lighthearted comedy about a couple who find an unusual secret in the basement of their quiet suburban home. Clocking in at only 74 minutes, the film uses its stars, Alain Chabat, Léa Drucker, Benoît Magimel, Anaïs Demoustier, and Stéphane Pezerat, to their full extent despite the brief timeline.
Tickets can be purchased here.
Nobody’s Hero (Viens, je t’emmène)
Category: Panorama
You might not expect a film that begins with a terrorist attack to be particularly funny, but Nobody’s Hero isn’t afraid to find humor in the dire. Directed by Alain Guiraudie, this satirical yet serious movie takes on an everyman (Jean-Charles Clichet), the sex worker he falls in love with (Noémie Lvovsky), the young Arab man he takes in (Iliès Kadri), and a host of other characters trying to figure out what neighborly solidarity means in a time of paranoia and prejudice.
Tickets can be purchased here.
About Joan (À Propos de Joan)
Category: Berlinale Special Gala
It’s not an international film festival without a little bit of Isabelle Huppert. About Joan stars the French icon in a dreamlike tale of a woman’s journey from Ireland to France, through love and loss, motherhood and career, in this production from director Laurent Larivière.
Tickets can be purchased here.
Coma
Category: Encounters
Not quite fact, not quite fiction, Coma is a pandemic commentary about the dangers and delights of living online. Director Bertrand Bonello takes his 18-year-old daughter (played by Louise Labeque) as his subject, in this darkly funny and fantastical trip through video chats and daydreams. Julia Faure plays a mysterious influencer by the name of Patricia Coma, while actors like the late Gaspard Ulliel voice roles in this feature mixing live action and animation.
Tickets can be purchased here.
