Festivals: Berlin / EFM
Berlinale 2025 Review: LESBIAN SPACE PRINCESS Merges Irreverent Humor with Queer Sci-Fi Coming of Age
Leela Varghese and Emma Hough Hobbs directed the funniest film of this year's Berlinale, a campy queer coming-of-age space opera.
Berlinale 2025 Review: 1001 FRAMES Exposes Power, Performance, and Control
Mehrnoush Alia's audition thriller examines the blurred boundaries between artistic authority and coercion in an Iranian take on a casting couch.
Berlinale 2025 Review: REFLECTION IN A DEAD DIAMOND Dissects the Eurospy Genre
Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani continue their deconstruction of genre cinema in a visual rollercoaster, consisting of formal pyrotechnics and a disorienting narrative.
Berlinale 2025 Review: WHAT DOES THAT NATURE SAY TO YOU, Subtle Shifts and Social Barriers in Hong Sangsoo's Latest
Hong Sangsoo's latest film continues his exploration of fleeting social encounters, using his signature minimalism to dissect class, artistic ambition, and underlying tensions within intimate spaces.
Berlinale 2025 Review: DREAMS (SEX LOVE), Shapeshifting Coming-of-Age Examines Desire Across Three Generations
Dag Johan Haugerud examines the fluid boundaries between love, desire, and memory in a film where language shapes both personal discovery and intergenerational reflection.
Berlinale 2025 Review: KONTINENTAL '25, Between Docu-Essay and Dramedy, Romanian Punk Neorealism
Radu Jude's latest film continues his engagement with social critique in exploration of guilt, complicity, and systemic inertia while returning to the stripped-down aesthetics of his earlier works.
Berlinale 2025 Review: TIMESTAMP, School During War in Ukraine
Kateryna Gornostai's powerful documentary considers how the Ukrainian war affects schoolchildren.
Berlinale 2025 Review: PA-GWA / THE OLD WOMAN WITH THE KNIFE, Assassin Finds Herself Targeted
Min Kyu-dong's film stars Lee Hye-young in the story of an assassin who finds herself targeted after a botched hit.
Berlinale 2025 Review: CONFIDANTE, Power and Morality Collide in Chamber Thriller
Çağla Zencirci and Guillaume Giovanetti craft a restrained chamber thriller, merging socio-political inquiry with genre filmmaking to explore agency, entrapment, and power dynamics within the confines of an erotic call center in late-1990s Turkey.
Berlinale 2025 Interview: THE LONGING Director Toshizo Fujiwara Talks Social Realism, Mentorship, and Learning From Each Other
Toshizo Fujiwara is leaning forward in his Zoom window as I speak, listening intently and smiling in recognition. We’re discussing the warmth that he demonstrates towards people in his filmmaking, and the more that he shares, the more the rhythms...
Berlinale 2025 Review: GIRLS ON WIRE, Gangsters Pursue Stunt Double and Her Cousin
Wen Qi shines as a stuntwoman chased by a drug ring.
Berlinale 2025 Review: HOT MILK, Angry Daughter, Flighty Lover, Manipulative Mother on Vacation
Emma Mackey, Fiona Shaw, Vicky Krieps, Vincent Perez, and Patsy Ferran star in director Rebecca Lenkiewicz's film about a daughter who uncovers secrets about both her lover and her mother.
Berlinale 2025 Review: ISLANDS, Tennis Pro Finds Himself a Murder Suspect
Dawn in a desert. A body in the sand. Is it a corpse? No, it's Tom, a tennis bum recovering from another night of debauchery. The Canary Islands resort where he gives lessons gleams in the distance. The clever opening...
Berlinale 2025 Review: MICKEY 17, Bong Joon Ho Takes Us to the Stars in Angry and Amusing Sci-fi Comedy
With his latest film, Bong Joon Ho reaches for the stars but what his characters discover in the far reaches of space is just another version of the messed-up world they left behind, a world Bong has laid bare for...
Berlinale 2025 Review: HOW TO BE NORMAL AND THE ODDNESS OF THE OTHER WORLD, Keeping It Together
Director Florian Pochlatko, like The Daniels' 'Everything Everywhere All at Once,' balances the heady subject with plenty of humor and great visual gags.
Berlinale 2025 Review: HYSTERIA Reveals Deep Chasm in Turkish-German Experience
Director and writer Mehmet Akif Büyükatalay has a knack for making an anxiety inducing thriller.
Berlinale 2025 Preview: Richard Linklater, Lucile Hadžihalilović, Radu Jude, Hong Sangsoo, Gabriel Mascaro
The 2025 Berlinale Film Festival marks a new chapter in its storied history, debuting under the artistic leadership of Tricia Tuttle with a line-up that seeks to embrace audience friendly world cinema.
Berlinale 2025: Exclusive HYSTERIA Poster Premiere
Mehmet Akif Büyükatalay's 'Hysteria' is a gripping exploration of chaos, identity, and power, set against the backdrop of a film set unraveling in the aftermath of a provocative and divisive act.
Berlinale 2025: Exclusive HOW TO BE NORMAL AND THE ODDNESS OF THE OTHER WORLD Poster Premiere
Florian Pochlatko's debut feature is a genre-defying take on mental health, identity, and the disorienting realities of young adulthood, set to premiere in the new Perspectives competition at Berlinale.
Friday One Sheet: ANOTHER END
The second poster for Piero Messina's Another End features two lovers sleeping towards each other, almost touching hands, on an 'endless' bed of beige. For me, it evokes the key art for Atom Egoyan's 1997 Canadian masterpiece, The Sweet Hereafter. The...
