Mati Diop © Dirk Michael Deckbar, courtesy of the Berlinale 2024
There were a lot of themes at this year’s Berlin International Film Festival and some resonated deeply with me, as the world tries to wade through the perils of certainty — those who think they always know better.
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Mariëtte Rissenbeek and Carlo Chatrian announcing this year’s Competition & Encounters line up on Monday
While many of us may be concentrating on the awards announcements, the Berlin Film Festival reminds us where it all starts from, and why these worldwide events are so important. Dare I say, more than the awards…
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Every year in cinema calendars February belongs to the Berlin International Film Festival, and this year it will be extra special, as the upcoming edition marks the last one with Carlo Chatrian as Artistic Director.
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Meg Ryan with Carlo Chatrian, Artistic Director of the Locarno Festival
Yes. You read the title right. I didn't make a mistake, I meant it to read that way.
A bit of background first. I grew into my skin watching Meg Ryan's films. Notice I didn't say "grew up" because Ms. Ryan and I are from the same generation -- and yes, we look damn great! Thank you. But as I was saying, I discovered the America I always knew existed, I found love, I dumped love and moved on, I cried a lot in between, and all to the rhythm of Meg Ryan's movies. So when the Locarno Festival asked me to moderate a public Forum talk with the wondrous actress I said YES! And pinched myself a few times to make sure I wasn't dreaming.
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As I flew over to Milan to reach Locarno then by car over the Alps, I watched 'The Gospel According to André' on the plane -- the documentary about the grand fashion figure that is André Leon Talley. It was a perfect way to dive into the Locarno Festival since Talley's life has been all about courage and bold choices and this year's film festival is channeling that spirit exactly.
Also, as a woman I find solace at an event that kicks off with a press release announcing their commitment to sign the Programming Pledge for Parity and Inclusion in Cinema Festivals for parity and equality in the industry. Locarno will be the first festival after Cannes to commit to this pledge. So on August 5th at 9.45 a.m. Marco Solari, Locarno Festival President and Carla Speziali, Locarno Festival Vice President, will gather at the Spazio Forum to publicly and officially sign the initiative by SWAN, the Swiss Women’s Audiovisual Network, a sister movement to the French 5050x2020 campaign that took place on the steps of the Palais this May 2018 during the Cannes Film Festival.
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With today's official announcement of Carlo Chatrian having been chosen as Artistic Director of the Berlinale starting in 2020, the Italians have truly taken over world cinema. Now, let me explain.
Apart from, obviously, Alberto Barbera at the Venice Film Festival, Giona A. Nazzaro at Venice Critics' Week, Antonio Monda at Rome FF and Emanuela Martini in Torino, there are several more Italian cinephiles sprinkled around, now heading film festivals around the world. Take Marco Müller in Pingyao China and Eva Sangiorgi who was appointed head of the Viennale back in January of 2018, after former director Hans Hurch suddenly passed away last July. Then, just a couple of months before the Cannes Film Festival was set to kick off, another announcement rocked the film world when it was made public that Paolo Moretti would replace Edouard Waintrop as General Delegate of the Quinzaine des Réalisateurs starting with the 2019 edition of the beloved sidebar on the Croisette.So why are so many Italians snagging the top spots at these most coveted of film festivals? Well, I have a couple of theories.
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COURTESY OF THE LOCARNO FILM FESTIVAL
A film festival is of course only as great as the sum of its parts, and one very important, visual and ever-present part of the well-loved and hyper-attended festival that is Locarno is represented in the figure of its Artistic Director, Carlo Chatrian. A film journalist, writer, film programmer and now as the visionary head of the festival, Chatrian has been a part of Locarno Festival since 2002, inheriting his latest role in 2013. Those attending, as well as those following the event on social media and through their informative, interactive website, will notice his infectious enthusiasm. When I caught up with him on the next to last day of the festival, after he greeted the delegations of the day’s films during lunch — an activity he calls “a pleasure, after spending so much time in the dark watching films, to see these films come to light, and meet those who have done that work” — and then did a lively TV interview, he still had energy to spare. I, on the other hand, was exhausted by then.
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COURTESY OF THE LOCARNO FILM FESTIVAL
A still from Rana Eid’s ‘Panoptic’
It is not often that a film journalist like me gets to experience the stuff hard core news are made of in first person, up close. I mean, I’ve been privy to some great cinematic history in the making and yes, I lived in NYC at the time of the attacks of 9/11 so I watched unmentionable horror unfolding before my very eyes, but in Locarno I feel part of another narrative that will affect the world as we know it.
I’m talking about the sudden decision by UN war crimes Special Prosecutor Carla del Ponte to quit her post, because she feels that Syria is now “a land without future”. Appointed to a three-member panel set up in August 2011 by the Human Rights Council to monitor the al-Assad regime and the unfolding civil war in Syria remotely, del Ponte represented the one slight hope for justice and yet today, that hope seems gone. Having previously sat on tribunals that investigated atrocities in Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia, del Ponte is most famous for putting Serbian leader Slobodan Milošević on trial at The Hague. And for having stood up to Sicily’s La Cosa Nostra and won, by simply walking away with her life. Now that’s a hero of a woman right there!
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COURTESY OF THE LOCARNO FILM FESTIVAL
David Lynch and Harry Dean Stanton in a still from ‘Lucky’
Locarno is a really pleasant surprise. While Cannes may be the glitziest, Venice the oldest and Berlinale the most packed with titles, the Locarno Film Festival is a rockstar among film fests. Starting from its frontman, Artistic Director Carlo Chatrian, to the stars attending and what they are wearing, from the films shown, to how those in the media can comfortably attend mostly everything on their wish lists, Locarno stands out as the hip, cool and happening event.
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COURTESY OF THE LOCARNO FILM FESTIVAL
Noémi Lvovsky and Luce Rodriguez in a still from ‘Tomorrow and Thereafter’
The city of Locarno, located on the Lago Maggiore, is reached by crossing a tunnel through a mountain that felt like it was a dozen kilometers long. It’s moments like those, in the darkness and echo of an eerie place deep into the core of a solid rock formation that I feel smallest on this earth. But also in awe of the grandness of my fellow humans, who could envision such a project before its inception and managed to dig a passageway where it must have seemed impossible. Perhaps the perfect example that even a journey of a thousand miles begins with one, single step.
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