Screen critics recommend the top films at the 2018 Berlin Film Festival.
Read more: ‘Touch Me Not’ wins 2018 Golden Bear
Museum
Dir: Alonso Ruizpalacios
Our critic said: “While Ruizpalacios has the time of his life playing with style, Museum also offers a serious commentary on Mexican history and the contradictions of the anthropology and archeology industry, as seen in an opening archive newsreel and a provocative monologue from Russell Beale.”
International sales: Luxbox, festivals@luxboxfilms.com
Read the full review HERE
In The Aisles
Dir: Thomas Stuber
Our critic said: “In her first significant role since the triumphant Toni Erdmann, Hüller has humour positively dancing in her eyes and around her mouth. But her flirtatious Marion is married, albeit unhappily. As that reality sinks in, for both, Stuber pulls aside his hitherto fanciful façade and reveals the pain felt by characters whose thankless jobs barely enable them to make ends meet.”
International sales: Beta Cinema, beta@betacinema.com
Read full review HERE
Styx
Dir: Wolfgang Fischer
Our critic said: “Death, and the spectre thereof, haunts Wolfgang Fischer’s Styx at nearly every point, as its allusive title might suggest. Premiering in the Panorama Special programme, this sobering, nearly dialogue-free drama follows a burned out emergency medic as she seeks restorative calm on a solo yacht trip, only to find out there’s no escaping life’s pitiless turns.”
International sales: Beta Cinema, beta@betacinema.com
Read the full review HERE
Isle Of Dogs
Dir: Wes Anderson
Our critic said: “The film is bursting with colour out of its elaborate miniatures, audacious choices which demand to be admired (bright purple volcanos, vibrant reds, cherry blossoms, leached-out sequences which pay tribute to Japanese cinema’s majestic past). Isle Of Dogs is also filled with music throughout (regular collaborator Alexandre Desplat is not easily identifiable in a robustly Japanese score), even if it’s only whistling.”
Worldwide distribution: Fox Searchlight
Read the full review HERE
The Heiresses
Dir: Marcelo Martinessi
Our critic said: “There is much to admire for those who chime with the languid rhythms and language of loaded sidelong glances. An acting prize for the mesmerising Ana Brun is not out of the question; this would certainly give a boost to the picture going forward from its premiere in competition in Berlin. Further festival berths seem assured.”
International sales: Luxbox, festivals@luxboxfilms.com
Read the full review HERE
U-July 22
Dir: Erik Poppe
Our critic said: “While the script is based on testimonies, the characters are fictitious. Despite the death count, the result is not the on-screen bloodbath it might have been, but an achingly visceral suggestion of how it must feel to be inside an ongoing assault (terrorist or otherwise), with the uncertainty, panic and fear that creates.”
International sales: TrustNordisk, info@trustnordisk.com
Read the full review HERE
Boys Cry
Dir: Damiano D’Innocenzo
Our critic said: “An intelligent, involving story is buoyed by two excellent central performances from newcomers Matteo Olivetti and Andrea Carpenzano, and further festival play should follow the film’s Berlin Panorama bow. Theatrical interest should be particularly strong at home, but the picture should chime with international audiences previously drawn to high quality, provocative European fare such as Girlhood (2014), A Prophet (2009) and Gomorrah (2008).”
International sales: The Match Factory, info@matchfactory.de
Read the full review HERE
Sunday’s Illness
Dir: Ramón Salazar
Our critic said: “The first encounter between estranged mother and daughter is blistering. Surrounded by the wreckage of a dinner party, Anabel gestures dismissively for a final glass of red wine. It is then that she recognises Chiara; until that point invisible as just another member of the waiting staff. There is a long moment of stricken silence, then Chiara drops a scrawled note on the table and wordlessly walks away.”
International sales: Zeta Cinema, infocine@zetaaudiovisual.es
Read the full review HERE
Eldorado
Dir: Markus Imhoof
Our critic said: “In the soft-spoken but hard-hitting documentary Eldorado, Markus Imhoof shows us souls in purgatory; refugees who may have survived the hazardous crossing to Europe from Africa, but are barely allowed to exist once they get there.”
International sales: Films Boutique, contact@filmsboutique.com
Read the full review HERE
The Green Fog
Dir: Guy Maddin, Evan Johnson, Galen Johnson
Our critic said: “A dazzling, studious exercise in found footage excavation and reconfiguration, laced with tongue in cheek. It’s a love letter to Hitchcock’s Vertigo and the city of San Francisco… and perhaps also to Rock Hudson. And Chuck Norris. Continued festival play is a given.”
International sales: The Festival Agency, iv@thefestivalagency.com
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