Film Festivals
Tokyo International Film Festival 2013—Part 2
Blind Dates from Georgia and Nobody’s Home from Turkey
By John Watanabe, 2 November 2013
The recent Tokyo International Film Festival, held October 17-25, screened a number of films worth commenting on.
Tokyo International Film Festival 2013—Part 1
Two films from China: One is honest and sympathetic, the other is not
By John Watanabe, 28 October 2013
The recent Tokyo International Film Festival, held October 17-25, screened a number of films worth commenting on.
Toronto International Film Festival 2013
An interview with Dyana Gaye, director of Under the Starry Sky
By David Walsh, 2 October 2013
David Walsh spoke to Dyana Gaye, the Franco-Senegalese director of Under the Starry Sky during the recent Toronto film festival.
Toronto International Film Festival 2013—Part 5
A filmmaker sees and does something important
By David Walsh, 2 October 2013
Franco-Senegalese director Dyana Gaye’s Under the Starry Sky takes place in three cities simultaneously, over the course of one winter.
Toronto International Film Festival 2013—Part 4
The drama of life in Britain, the Middle East, India, Poland and Bosnia…
By Joanne Laurier, 30 September 2013
The Toronto film festival screened a number of honest and compassionate works. Some tackled World War II and its aftermath, while others immersed themselves in current issues.
Toronto International Film Festival 2013—Part 3
Tensions and pressures that are almost unbearable
By David Walsh, 27 September 2013
Films by Palestinian, Chinese, Greek and Moroccan directors stood out.
2013 Toronto International Film Festival
Interview with Hany Abu-Assad, director of Omar
By David Walsh, 27 September 2013
David Walsh spoke to Palestinian director Hany Abu-Assad, director of Omar, at the recent Toronto International Film Festival.
Toronto International Film Festival 2013–Part 2
12 Years a Slave and other films
By Joanne Laurier, 23 September 2013
One of the most prominently featured and commented upon films at the 2013 Toronto film festival was 12 Years a Slave from British director Steve McQueen, based on the remarkable 1853 account written by Solomon Northup.
Toronto International Film Festival 2013—Part 1
Twenty years of covering the Toronto film festival
By David Walsh, 20 September 2013
The recent Toronto International Film Festival screened some 366 films from 70 countries. This is the first in a series of articles.
San Francisco International Film Festival 2013—Part six
Two very different documentaries: Sofia’s Last Ambulance and Sing Me The Songs That Say I Love You—A Concert for Kate McGarrigle
By David Walsh, 4 June 2013
The recent San Francisco film festival screened a number of documentary films, including these two, contrasting works.
San Francisco International Film Festival 2013—Part five
La Sirga and In the Fog: When will the “fog of war” settle?
By Kevin Kearney, 30 May 2013
La Sirga from Colombia and In the Fog, from a Belarusian filmmaker, deal with painful wartime situations, with varying degrees of success.
San Francisco International Film Festival 2013—Part four
The plight of African boat people in The Pirogue, and other films
By Joanne Laurier, 27 May 2013
Moussa Touré’s The Pirogue is a fictional account of West Africans seeking to escape grinding poverty in a desperate voyage. Also, Joanne Laurier comments on documentaries about the Beatles’ secretary and the Chinese art scene.
San Francisco International Film Festival 2013—Part three
Museum Hours and The Artist and the Model: In defense of art and the artistic personality
By David Walsh, 24 May 2013
At least two films at the San Francisco festival treated art, the artistic personality, or both, in a compelling fashion.
San Francisco Film Festival 2013
An interview with Jem Cohen, director of Museum Hours: “Art is something people do like breathing.”
By David Walsh, 24 May 2013
David Walsh spoke to Jem Cohen, director of Museum Hours, during the recent San Francisco film festival.
San Francisco International Film Festival 2013—Part two
Let the Fire Burn and The East: The MOVE bombing in 1985 and present-day anarchism
By Kevin Kearney, 22 May 2013
Let the Fire Burn, about the police bombing of the MOVE compound in Philadelphia in 1985, was one of the most outstanding and challenging documentaries at the San Francisco film festival this year.
San Francisco International Film Festival 2013—Part one
The Kill Team: The murderous reality of the US war in Afghanistan
By Joanne Laurier, 16 May 2013
The 56th San Francisco International Film Festival recently concluded. The event this year screened 158 films from 51 countries, including 67 fiction features, 28 documentary features and 63 short films.
Bryan Wizemann’s About Sunny (Think of Me) released on video on demand
By David Walsh, 26 March 2013
One of the most compelling films screened at the 2011 Toronto International Film Festival, Think of Me, directed by American filmmaker Bryan Wizemann, now retitled About Sunny, is finally available.
63rd Berlin International Film Festival—Part 8
No holds barred: Two German documentaries— I Will Not Lose and Metamorphoses
By Bernd Reinhardt, 18 March 2013
One of the documentaries examines the former East German sports programme and the other the terrible consequences of the 1957 nuclear accident near Kyshtym in the USSR.
63rd Berlin International Film Festival—Part 7
“The Weimar Touch”: An interview with Rainer Rother, director of the 2013 Berlin film festival’s retrospective
By Stefan Steinberg and Berndt Reinhardt, 13 March 2013
WSWS reporters spoke recently to the head of the Deutsche Kinemathek (German Cinematheque) and the curator of this year’s Berlin film festival retrospective on German films of the Weimar era (1919-1933).
63rd Berlin International Film Festival—Part 5
Raoul Peck’s Fatal Assistance: An indictment of Western aid to Haiti, but…
By Stefan Steinberg:, 6 March 2013
The latest film by Haitian-born director Raoul Peck focuses on the aid operation organised by the US and Western powers in the wake of the deadly earthquake that struck Haiti in January 2010.
63rd Berlin International Film Festival—Part 4
An honest Russian citizen: Boris Khlebnikov’s A Long and Happy Life
By Bernd Reinhardt, 4 March 2013
The film depicts the futile struggle of a small farmer in the Russian provinces against corrupt local authorities.
63rd Berlin International Film Festival—Part 3
What Ken Loach makes of The Spirit of ’45
By Stefan Steinberg, 1 March 2013
The veteran British filmmaker’s new documentary deals with the nationalisation of sections of industry carried out by the Labour government following the Second World War.
63rd Berlin International Film Festival—Part 2
The Plague: The “loneliness, strength, humanity and beauty” of ordinary people
By Francisca Vier, 27 February 2013
The Plague (La Plaga) from Spain, directed by Neus Ballús, was one of the most satisfying films at the 63rd Berlinale.
63rd Berlin International Film Festival—Part 1
Unresolved issues in today’s filmmaking
By Stefan Steinberg, 21 February 2013
A number of interesting films from central and eastern Europe were awarded prizes in Berlin this year, but, unfortunately, they were not characteristic of the festival as a whole.
Toronto International Film Festival 2012—Part 7
Underground: The Julian Assange Story and Roman Polanski: Odd Man Out
By Joanne Laurier, 12 October 2012
Julian Assange’s early life is fictionalized by Australian director Robert Connolly, while documentarian Marina Zenovich offers the latest installment in the Roman Polanski saga.
Toronto International Film Festival 2012—Part 6
Interviews with five filmmakers about life and art in India, Ivory Coast, Guatemala, Angola and Haiti
By David Walsh, 9 October 2012
A good many honest and intriguing films screened at the recent Toronto film festival. The WSWS interviewed a number of directors about their films and the conditions in their respective countries.
Toronto International Film Festival 2012—Part 5
Detroit’s belated “renaissance”—on film
By Joanne Laurier, 5 October 2012
A number of films about Detroit have suddenly emerged … including now a fiction work about the complicated interactions between the city’s Arab and African American populations.
Toronto International Film Festival 2012—Part 4
Far From Afghanistan: Significant, moving, uneven
By David Walsh, 2 October 2012
Far From Afghanistan is an effort by five US directors to come to terms with the decade-long Afghanistan war and its implications for both the Afghan and American populations.
Toronto International Film Festival 2012--Part 3
Filmmakers respond to important events—but how they respond is also important …
By Joanne Laurier, 28 September 2012
The 2012 Toronto film festival screened numerous serious documentaries and docu-dramas, reflecting the impact of the current social crisis and the increasing resistance of the global working class.
Toronto International Film Festival 2012—Part 2
A World Not Ours: Where do the Palestinians go from here?
By David Walsh, 26 September 2012
Mahdi Fleifel’s A World Not Ours, one of the most remarkable films presented at the Toronto festival this year, is both a personal memoir and a tracing out of the Palestinian history and condition.
Toronto International Film Festival 2012
An interview with Mahdi Fleifel and Patrick Campbell, director and co-producer of A World Not Ours
By David Walsh, 26 September 2012
The WSWS spoke to Mahdi Fleifel, writer and director of A World Not Ours and Patrick Campbell, co-producer (along with Fleifel) of the film, during the recent Toronto film festival.
Toronto International Film Festival 2012—Part 1
The wide range of human passion, action and adventure
By David Walsh, 22 September 2012
The Toronto International Film Festival screened some 372 films this year from 72 countries. This year’s festival and the general state of the film world present a sharper contradiction than ever.
Sydney Film Festival—Part 6: Bernardo Bertolucci’s rise and fall
By Richard Phillips, 18 August 2012
Bernardo Bertolucci has been the focus of much commentary by film critics during his 50-year filmmaking career.
Sydney Film Festival—Part 5: Dead Europe and Mabo, two Australian features
By Gabriela Zabala, 16 August 2012
Australian features Dead Europe and Mabo are weak and unconvincing works.
Sydney Film Festival 2012—Part 4: Two love stories and a couple of class-conscious dramas from Korea and Brazil
By Robert Maras, 15 August 2012
Tabu by Portuguese director Miguel Gomes and Amour, Michael Haneke recent film, are different takes on the subject of love.
Sydney Film Festival—Part 3: Some naturalistic and mostly credible depictions
By Richard Phillips, 10 August 2012
Noteworthy features screened at the festival included Just the Wind, The Angels’ Share and Captive.
Sydney Film Festival—Part 2: Music as a dividing or unifying social force
By Gabriela Zabala, 8 August 2012
El Gusto was the most engaging of the three music documentaries seen at this year’s festival.
Sydney Film Festival 2012—Part 1: To shine a light on reality or flee from it
By Richard Phillips, 4 August 2012
This year’s festival screened over 150 titles with 12 features in the official competition. Most of the competing features, including the prize winner, failed to impress.
San Francisco International Film Festival 2012—Part 4
Twixt and Trishna: Weak films from Coppola and Winterbottom
By Kevin Kearney, 30 May 2012
New films by veteran directors Francis Ford Coppola and Michael Winterbottom were screened at the recent San Francisco film festival.
San Francisco International Film Festival 2012—Part 3
Two significant works: Fritz Lang’s House by the River (1950) and Carol Reed’s The Third Man (1949)
By Kevin Kearney, 22 May 2012
Screenings of Fritz Lang’s House by the River (1950) and Carol Reed’s The Third Man (1949) were highlights of the 2012 an Francisco film festival.
San Francisco International Film Festival 2012—Part 2
Crulic—The Path to Beyond from Romania: The tragic fate of a decent, humble human being
By Kevin Kearney, 19 May 2012
The second film by Romanian filmmaker Anca Damian, Crulic—The Path to Beyond, was another noteworthy documentary (or semi-documentary) featured at the 2012 San Francisco film festival.
San Francisco International Film Festival 2012—Part 1
How have filmmakers responded to the new global situation?
By Kevin Kearney, 17 May 2012
The recently concluded 55th San Francisco International Film Festival screened nearly 200 films (including shorts) from several dozen countries. The Law in These Parts from Israel was one of the most intriguing and powerful.
Citizen Gangster: A drama of postwar Canadian life
By David Walsh, 15 May 2012
Citizen Gangster [Edwin Boyd] is an unusual film, which depicts social relations in Canada in a relatively harsh light and does not take as its premise the “kinder, gentler” nature of life there.
The Deep Blue Sea: Love and emotional truth in post-war Britain
By Ruby Rankin and Richard Phillips, 25 April 2012
The Deep Blue Sea, with its flawed individuals, living through the depths of despair but finding the strength to behave with personal integrity, has been revived on film by Terence Davies.
62nd Berlin International Film Festival—Part 5
Left-wing German films in the 1920s reveal problems
By Bernd Reinhardt, 16 March 2012
This year’s retrospective section at the Berlin film festival, “The Red Dream Factory”, included a number of intriguing German films produced by the German-Soviet film company Mezhrabpom in the 1920s and 1930s.
62nd Berlin International Film Festival—Part 4
Sergei Eisenstein’s October: a monumental work
By Bernd Reinhardt, 10 March 2012
The new HD version of Eisenstein’s epic October is a testament to the restored film’s ability to retain the spirit of the “ten days that shook the world”, despite its philistine truncation at the hands of the Stalinist bureaucracy.
62nd Berlin International Film Festival—Part 3
Interview with Rainer Rother, director of a Soviet-German film retrospective: “These films are a pledge that things can be different”
By Bernd Reinhardt and Stefan Steinberg, 6 March 2012
This year’s Berlin Film Festival featured a fascinating retrospective of films resulting from the collaboration between German and Soviet film producers and directors in the 1920s and 1930s. The WSWS spoke to its organiser.
62nd Berlin International Film Festival—Part 2
Political films in Berlin
By Stefan Steinberg, 29 February 2012
A number of film reviewers have been quick to draw a parallel between the Arab Spring revolutions and the opening film of the Berlinale, Farewell, My Queen, by the French director Benoît Jacquot.
62nd Berlin International Film Festival—Part 1
A few nuggets on display at the Berlinale
By Stefan Steinberg, 24 February 2012
This year’s Berlinale jury, headed by veteran British director Mike Leigh, awarded the festival’s principal prizes to a number of interesting and significant works.
Toronto International Film Festival 2011—Part 5
The defense of Iranian filmmakers, and their artistic decline
By David Walsh and Joanne Laurier, 26 October 2011
The recent Toronto film festival screened several films from Iran—including This is Not a Film, about the house arrest of filmmaker Jafar Panahi, co-directed by Panahi and Mojtaba Mirtahmasb, and Good Bye from Mohammad Rasoulof.
Toronto International Film Festival 2011—Part 4
The permanent, painful search for truth
By Joanne Laurier, 15 October 2011
A number of films at the recent Toronto film festival offered serious presentations of life and artistic problems themselves.
Toronto International Film Festival 2011—Part 3
The drama of everyday life
By David Walsh, 12 October 2011
Certain filmmakers are beginning to reckon with social questions as factors in human psychology and behavior. Others continue to take the line of least resistance.
“Emotional truth and social truth are what I’m interested in”
An interview with Bryan Wizemann, director of Think of Me
By David Walsh, 12 October 2011
David Walsh spoke to Bryan Wizemann, the director of Think of Me, during last month’s Toronto international film festival.
Toronto International Film Festival 2011—Part 2
Crimes and upheavals past and present
By Joanne Laurier, 5 October 2011
The best films from France in recent years have concerned themselves with the country’s colonial past and related issues today.
Toronto International Film Festival 2011—Part 1
The world at large and closer to home
By David Walsh, 30 September 2011
The recent 36th Toronto International Film Festival screened some 335 features and shorts from 65 countries.
Sydney Film Festival 2011—Part 6: Douglas Sirk’s elegant imitations of life
By Richard Phillips, 4 August 2011
Sirk’s best work reveals an exceptional artist and one whose visually-rich and socially-incisive observations still have a timeless quality.
Sydney Film Festival 2011—Part 5: A classic novel intelligently reworked, a light comedy and some less impressive efforts
By Richard Phillips, 1 August 2011
A new version of Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre and three other features looking for a niche somewhere between commercial and independent cinema.
Sydney Film Festival 2011—Part 4: A conversation with Shelly Kraicer about Chinese independent cinema
By Richard Phillips, 30 July 2011
Beijing resident and film festival programmer Shelly Kraicer discusses developments in the Chinese independent cinema.
Sydney Film Festival 2011—Part 3: Global warming, village life, and other documentaries
By Richard Phillips, 28 July 2011
A diverse range of subjects were examined in the more than thirty documentaries screened at this year’s festival.
Sydney Film Festival 2011—Part 2: An eclectic selection with a few valuable moments
By Richard Phillips, 26 July 2011
Festival competition movies varied widely in their range of cinematic styles and artistic sensitivity.
Sydney Film Festival 2011—Part 1: Social complexity versus the trivial
By Richard Phillips, 22 July 2011
This is the first in a series of articles on the 2011 Sydney film festival.
The political tone at this year’s Tribeca Film Festival
By Jordan Mattos, 14 May 2011
The recent Tribeca Film Festival screened some interesting works from Serbia, Hungary, Lebanon, Israel, Egypt, Korea, France and Romania in particular.
61st Berlin International Film Festival—Part 5
Dirk Lütter’s The Education: what today’s youth face
By Bernd Reinhardt, 27 April 2011
Dirk Lütter’s debut film The Education is a moving exposé of coldly impersonal operations and spying in the contemporary business world.
61st Berlin International Film Festival—Part 4
New films about former East Germany: Elke Hauck’s The Prize and Annekatrin Hendel’s Traitor to the Fatherland
By Bernd Reinhardt, 9 April 2011
Two young eastern German directors, representatives of the post-reunification generation, offer films probing conformity and dissent in former Stalinist East Germany.
61st Berlin International Film Festival—Part 3
Two intriguing competition films: Coriolanus and Margin Call
By Stefan Steinberg, 11 March 2011
Among the more interesting films in the Berlin film festival’s competition section were a version of Shakespeare’s Coriolanus, directed by actor Ralph Fiennes, and Margin Call, dealing with the financial crash of 2008.
61st Berlin International Film Festival—Part 2
Béla Tarr’s The Turin Horse: The social and the cosmic
By Stefan Steinberg, 7 March 2011
The animal referred to in the title of Béla Tarr’s new film is the horse embraced by the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche in a Turin public square in 1889.
61st Berlin International Film Festival—Part 1
Problems of the “personal” and “political” in cinema
By Stefan Steinberg, 3 March 2011
With a handful of honourable exceptions, the selection of films on view at this year’s Berlinale sadly failed to galvanise, stimulate, astound, or arouse profound feelings of empathy for the characters on screen.
Three films: Conviction, It’s Kind of a Funny Story, Inside Job
By Joanne Laurier, 9 November 2010
A number of films that appeared at the 2010 Toronto film festival, and on which we commented, have opened in North America. We repost the comments today.
Toronto International Film Festival 2010—Part 7
Ken Loach’s Route Irish: the Iraq war comes home
By David Walsh, 21 October 2010
British director Ken Loach has been a significant figure in filmmaking for more than 40 years. He first came to prominence in the 1960s with Cathy Come Home (1966) on British television and his first feature film, Kes (1969).
Toronto International Film Festival 2010
A conversation with Ken Loach
By David Walsh, 21 October 2010
David Walsh and Joanne Laurier spoke to director Ken Loach—accompanied by screenwriter Paul Laverty—about his latest film, Route Irish, and his career as a whole at the recent Toronto film festival.
Toronto International Film Festival 2010—Part 6
Walking around and near the problems
By Joanne Laurier, 18 October 2010
A number of documentaries at the Toronto film festival presented, with differing degrees of depth, various interesting facts about the modern world.
Toronto International Film Festival 2010—Part 5
What does it mean to take reality seriously?
By David Walsh, 14 October 2010
Films from Iran, China and Romania, including a conversation with Iranian filmmaker Rafi Pitts, director of The Hunter.
Toronto International Film Festival 2010
ANPO: Art X War—Art and opposition in postwar Japan
By Lee Parsons, 14 October 2010
ANPO: Art X War, a remarkable documentary from first-time director Linda Hoaglund, deals with the mass opposition that erupted in Japan in 1960 to the continuation of the US military presence in that country.
Toronto International Film Festival 2010—Part 4
American fiction
By Joanne Laurier, 6 October 2010
A number of fiction films from the US, straddling the line between independent and commercial cinema, and featuring well-known Hollywood names, attempted to work through different aspects of social reality and their impact on emotional life.
Toronto International Film Festival 2010—Part 3
Even the Rain and the need for dealing with complexity
By David Walsh, 1 October 2010
Even the Rain (Tambien la lluvia), from director Icíar Bollaín (Spain) and screenwriter Paul Laverty (Britain), was one of the most serious and complicated films screened at the Toronto film festival.
Toronto International Film Festival 2010—Part 2
Tears of Gaza director: “How could one not want to show the world what is happening?”
By Joanne Laurier, 28 September 2010
Tears of Gaza, directed by Norway’s Vibeke Løkkeberg, is a powerful documentary. The filmmakers collected video footage shot by Palestinians during the Israeli onslaught in December 2008-January 2009. The film follows three children in particular.
Toronto International Film Festival 2010—Part 1
Filmmaking in 2010
By David Walsh, 23 September 2010
This year’s Toronto film festival screened some 340 films, from 59 countries. Productions from the US, France, Canada, Germany and the UK dominated the list, in quantity, if not always (or even generally) quality.
Sydney Film Festival 2010—Part 6: Two classics and one that might have been
By Ismet Redzovic and Richard Phillips, 23 July 2010
This year’s festival screened new prints of A Woman Under the Influence and The Last Days of Chez Nous, as well as a new documentary, Henri-Georges Clouzot’s Inferno.
Sydney Film Festival 2010—Part 5: Corruption, war in the Middle East, poverty in the US and other issues
By Richard Phillips, 19 July 2010
A diverse group of dramas from Haiti, the US, Britain and the Middle East.
Sydney Film Festival 2010—Part 4: If I Want to Whistle, I Whistle and How I Ended Last Summer
By Ismet Redzovic, 14 July 2010
An insightful Romanian film, about the plight of youth there, and a less satisfying Russian thriller were featured at the Sydney festival.
Sydney Film Festival 2010—Part 3: Thai-style magic realism, Chinese history and poverty in the Philippines
By Richard Phillips, 10 July 2010
A disparate group of features from Asia, some of them dealing with important historical or social questions, were screened at this year’s Sydney festival.
“The level of government secrecy today is incredible”
A conversation with Judith Ehrlich
By Richard Phillips, 7 July 2010
Documentary filmmaker Judith Ehrlich (The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers) spoke with the World Socialist Web Site during the Sydney Film Festival.
Sydney Film Festival 2010—Part 2: Last Train Home and The Most Dangerous Man in America and two less successful documentaries
By Richard Phillips, 7 July 2010
This year’s Sydney Film Festival screened over 30 documentaries, a couple of which deserve much wider audiences than they are likely to receive.
San Francisco International Film Festival 2010 Part 6: Luchino Visconti’s Senso—drama and history
By David Walsh, 3 June 2010
Senso, the 1954 film directed by Luchino Visconti about the Italian national unification struggle in the nineteenth century, is a beautiful and important work.
San Francisco International Film Festival 2010
An interview with Woo Ming-jin, director of Woman on Fire Looks for Water, and a comment
By David Walsh, 3 June 2010
An interview with the young Malaysian film director, Woo Ming-jin, and a comment on his new film, Woman on Fire Looks for Water.
San Francisco International Film Festival 2010 Part 5: The small pictures that still dominate
By Joanne Laurier and David Walsh, 28 May 2010
Films from Iran, Germany, Palestine, Belgium, Mexico, South Korea, the US and China exhibit some of the same “smallness,” some of the same passivity, some of the same aversion to tracing out phenomena historically.
San Francisco International Film Festival 2010 Part 4: An Indian masterpiece
By Joanne Laurier, 21 May 2010
Jalsaghar (1958) The Music Room>, considered to be one of Satyajit Ray’s finest achievements, was screened at the San Francisco film festival this year. The work has been restored by Academy Film Archive with funding provided by the Film Foundation.
San Francisco International Film Festival 2010 Part 3: War, and more war
By Joanne Laurier, 14 May 2010
Several documentaries screened at the San Francisco film festival criticized aspects of the US interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan. Under the banner of “nonpolitical” filmmaking, however, the various works avoided the most critical questions.
San Francisco International Film Festival 2010 Part 2: Susa—The type of life that requires illusions
By David Walsh, 11 May 2010
Susa, directed by Rusudan Pirveli and written by Giorgi Chalauri, comes from Georgia, the former Soviet Republic. The title character (played by Avtandil Tetradze) is a boy living in bad conditions, somewhere outside the capital city of Tbilisi.
San Francisco International Film Festival 2010 Part 1: A few introductory words on this year’s event
By David Walsh, 7 May 2010
The recently concluded San Francisco International Film Festival was one of the more interesting in the last number of years. The festival screened some 177 films (including shorts) originating from several dozen countries.
60th Berlin International Film Festival—Part 6
The jurist Fritz Bauer and Germany’s Nazi past
By Bernd Reinhardt, 17 March 2010
The documentary Fritz Bauer—Tod auf Raten (Fritz Bauer—Death by Instalments), directed by Ilona Ziok, celebrates the German jurist and prosecutor Fritz Bauer (1903-1968), who now—unjustly—is almost forgotten.
60th Berlin International Film Festival—Part 5
Romania, Bosnia, and the problems of immigrants
By Stefan Steinberg, 11 March 2010
Romanian cinema has won a reputation in the last few years with a series of films by younger directors attempting to come to grips with the consequences of the introduction of the capitalist free market following the collapse of Stalinism.
60th Berlin International Film Festival—Part 4
This year’s German films: In general, a more serious tone
By Bernd Reinhardt, 6 March 2010
A number of trends currently find expression in German cinema. On the whole, this year’s feature and documentary films on view at the Berlinale adopted a more serious tone.
60th Berlin International Film Festival—Part 3
Kanikosen: a Japanese “proletarian novel,” updated
By Stefan Steinberg, 3 March 2010
This is the third in a series of articles on the recent Berlin International Film Festival, February 11-21.
60th Berlin International Film Festival—Part 2
Moloch Tropical and Jew Suss: Rise and Fall
By Stefan Steinberg, 26 February 2010
One of the most engrossing films at the Berlinale was the new film by Raoul Peck. After treating developments in a number of African countries in his more recent films, Peck has turned his attention to his native Haiti.
60th Berlin International Film Festival—Part 1
Roman Polanski’s The Ghost Writer, a new version of Metropolis, and other matters
By Stefan Steinberg, 24 February 2010
There was a dearth of substantial social and political films at the Berlinale, despite the biggest economic crisis since the 1930s. Nevertheless, a small number of the works on view made an attempt to come to grips with a rapidly changing situation.
Toronto International Film Festival 2009—Part 6
Thoroughly lost, or playing at it
By David Walsh, 17 October 2009
Lars von Trier from Denmark, once associated with the Dogme 95 group, has been making films for some two decades. His latest effort is Antichrist. It is a murky, hopelessly contrived, and, frankly, ridiculous film.
Toronto International Film Festival 2009—Part 5
Compassion, vision, genius
By Joanne Laurier, 14 October 2009
The poor throughout the world are neglected and abandoned, increasingly left by the authorities to their own devices. In an imaginative and sensitive fashion, some artists are beginning to concern themselves with this state of affairs.
Toronto International Film Festival 2009—Part 4
More human (and artistic) problems
By David Walsh, 10 October 2009
Where are the extraordinary and captivating film dramas, and comedies, that go to the heart of our time?
Toronto International Film Festival 2009
An interview with Asli Özge, director of Men on the Bridge
By David Walsh, 10 October 2009
Asli Özge is the director of Men on the Bridge, a Turkish film screened at the recent Toronto film festival. We spoke during the festival.
Follow us on