Outgoing Berlin Film Festival director Moritz de Hadeln has made a selection of personal cinematic memories from his 22-year tenure that will screen in a special sidebar at this year's event under the banner "Moritz' Favourites".

De Hadeln said he didn't want to put his own personality into the spotlight, but had been finally persuaded by Ulrich Eckhardt, former director of the Berliner Festspiele, to make a choice from more than 700 titles which had been invited to participate in the International Competition over the years.

"In selecting my favourites for this showcase, I have decided not to give any priority to jury decisions or to public taste, but to choose those films that merit in my mind to be rediscovered and of which I am particularly proud - even after so many years," De Hadeln said. "My taste for controversial themes and documentary material is - I guess - obvious. Film for me is not just entertainment, it is also an instrument of social struggle, a statement for a more tolerant and just society."

The result is a programme comprising 23 films which will be screened between February 8-18 at the CinemaxX 6 and will be accompanied by a tribute publication entitled Closing the Book by veteran film critic Volker Baer and de Hadeln.

The films showing in Moritz' Favourites are in chronological order:

1980 Cruising by William Friedkin (US)
1980 El Crimen De Cuenca by Pilar Miro (Spain)
1980 Palermo Oder Wolfsburg by Werner Schroeter (Germany)
1983 Koyaanisqatsi by Godfrey Reggio (US)
1983 Sans Soleil by Chris Marker (France)
1983 Pauline A La Plage by Eric Rohmer (France)
1984 Das Arche Noah Prinzip by Roland Emmerich (Germany)
1984 Le Bal by Ettore Scola (Italy)
1985 Brazil by Terry Gilliam (UK)
1985 Je Vous Salue, Marie/Le Livre De Marie by Jean-Luc Godard (France)
1986 Caravaggio by Derek Jarman (UK)
1986 Stammheim by Reinhard Hauff (Germany)
1987 Umi To Dokuyaku by Kei Kumai (Japan)
1988 Hong Gaoliang by Zhang Yimou (China)
1988 Komissar by Aleksandr Askoldow (USSR)
1988 Cry Freedom by Richard Attenborough (UK)
1990 Coming Out by Heiner Carow (Germany)
1992 La Guerre Sans Nom by Bertrand Tavernier (France)
1993 Hsi Yen by Ang Lee (Taiwan, China)
1995 Butterfly Kiss by Michael Winterbottom (UK)
1995 Smoke by Wayne Wang (US)
1998 On Connait La Chanson by Alain Resnais (France)
1998 Central Do Brasil by Walter Salles (Brazil)

Meanwhile, de Hadeln has revealed that after he has vacated his festival director post at the end of April, he will be setting up a Berlin-based consultancy with wife Erika, De Hadeln & Partners, to market their knowhow and network of international contacts in the fields of festival and event management, talent scouting and brokering co-productions.