Berlinale Bears at Meryl Streep’s discretion

This year’s Berlinale opens with Hail, Caesar! – a new work by the brothers Joel and Ethan Coen, a comedy slightly satirical about Hollywood customs. The main competition comprises 23 films, including 19 world premieres.

Among the competitors are both debutantes and experienced masters, such as Spike Lee and Alex Gibney (USA), Dominik Moll (France), Lee Tamahori (New Zealand), Denis Cote (Canada), Gianfranco Rosi (Italy), Lav Diaz (Philippines), Thomas Vinterberg (Denmark), Andre Techine (France), and Danis Tanovic (Bosnia and Herzegovina).

The international jury is chaired by the three times Oscar winning Meryl Streep. Those who will help her decide on Bear prize winners are the British star Clive Owen, the German actor Lars Eidinger, the film critic Nick James, the photographer Brigitte Lacombe, the Italian actress Alba Rohrwacher, and the Polish film director Malgorzata Szumowska.

Ukraine is represented by two films in parallel competitions.

The full-length non-fictional Mariupolis, directed by Mantas Kvedaravicius (a co-production of Lithuania, Germany, France, and Ukraine), was selected for the Panorama documentary section.

Kvedaravicius, who received the 2011 Berlinale Ecumenical Jury Prize for Barzakh, a film on kidnappings in Chechnya, describes this time the life in wartime Mariupol. There is no protagonist here, but every character has their own problems. A theater rehearses a play to be staged on May 9, a shoemaker’s daughter tries to master the craft of a military reporter, her father discusses religious matters with his female customers, and fishermen hope for a good catch. All this is accompanied by explosions on the city’s outskirts. The film was shot in the spring and fall of 2015 in Mariupol, Shyrokyne, and Sartana. Incidentally, it is in Panorama that Taras Tomenko’s The Shooting Gallery won a prize in 2001 – it was the first Berlinale award for our cinema since the proclamation of independence.

The short Without You (Sensiz), directed by the 24-year-old Nariman Aliev, will represent Ukraine in Generation 14 Plus, a competition for young filmmakers. Sensiz is the story of a Crimean Tatar family: two young people are trying to get to their elder brother’s birthday party. The main roles are played by amateur actors – the director’s cousins Fevzi and Remzi Bilyalov. The picture was shot in 2015 in Crimea.

Besides, the out-of-competition program includes the historical drama Hetman (directed by Valerii Yambursky, 2015) and The Eleventh Year made by Dziga Vertov, an avant-garde cinema classic, in 1928. This silent non-fictional film is furnished with a live music soundtrack by the Ukrainian composer and performer Anton Baibakov.

The Berlinale will last until February 21. The main prize is the Golden Bear for Best Film. The other awards are the Jury Grand Prix, Silver Bears for best director, actress, actor, screenwriter, the prize to a film that opens new perspectives on cinematic art (Alfred Bauer Prize), and the prize for Outstanding Artistic Contribution to Cinema.

As The Day’s correspondent, I will be informing our readers about the festival’s course of events.