Berlin 2022: Screen’s guide to the Panorama titles

The Apartment With Two Women (S Kor)

Dir Kim Se-in
Kim’s feature debut The Apartment With Two Women made its world premiere at Busan International Film Festival last October, where it picked up five prizes including the New Currents award and actress of the year for first-timer Im Jee-ho. Tensions between a mother (Im) and daughter (#Alive’s Yang Mal-bok) escalate when the mother runs over the daughter with her car. The film was produced by the Korean Academy of Film Arts and backed by the Korean Film Council.
Contact: Finecut

Beautiful Beings (Ice‑Den‑Swe-Neth-Cze)

Dir Gudmundur Arnar Gudmundsson
The second film from Iceland’s Arnar Gudmundsson is a drama about the violent undercurrents in young male friendships. It follows a gang of rough outsiders, one of whom was raised by a clairvoyant mother and may have inherited her gift. The director’s debut Heartstone swept the board with nine prizes at the 2017 Edda awards in Iceland and clocked up further wins at Chicago, CPH PIX, Göteborg, Tromso and the Queer Lion at Venice.
Contact: Katarzyna Siniarska, New Europe Film Sales

Concerned Citizen (Isr)

Dir Idan Haguel
Six years after his micro-budget debut feature Inertia played Berlin’s Forum, Israeli writer/director Haguel premieres his third film in Panorama. Set in Tel Aviv, Concerned Citizen is a satirical drama about tensions in a local neighbourhood over a newly planted tree. Haguel took part in the Berlinale Talent programme in 2017, and won Sarajevo’s CineLink work-in-progress award for his drama Neve Shaanan in 2019. He also serves as producer on Concerned Citizen.
Contact: m-appeal

Convenience Store (Rus-Slovenia-Turkey)

Dir Michael Borodin
Uzbekistan-born director Borodin’s debut short Normal (Ya Normalniy) played in Critics’ Week at Cannes 2018, and he now brings his debut feature to Berlin’s Panorama. Convenience Store took part in Critics’ Week’s Next Step development programme in 2019, and is a drama focused on Uzbeki immigrants working illegally in a Moscow store. The film is produced by Artem Vasilyev of Moscow’s Metrafilms, recently behind No Looking Back from director Kirill Sokolov.
Contact Heretic

Fogareu (Braz-Fr)

Dir Flavia Neves
Rising Brazilian filmmaker Neves shot the series Amanajé, The Messenger Of The Future and makes her feature debut with Fogareu. Barbara Colen stars as a woman who returns to her wealthy uncle’s home to scatter her adoptive mother’s ashes, and learns the truth about her origins. Vania Catani of Bananeira Filmes (Lucrecia Martel’s Zama, Anita Rocha da Silveira’s Medusa) produces Fogareu, which went through Ventana Sur 2020’s Primer Corte post-production strand and is supported by Brazil’s Ancine and CNC in France.
Contact Vania Catani, Bananeira Filmes 

Grand Jeté (Ger)

Dir Isabelle Stever
Based on Anke Stelling’s award-winning novel Care (Fürsorge), Stever’s unconventional drama centres on an incestuous relationship between a ballet teacher and her son after years of separation. US dancer and choreographer Sarah Nevada Grether, once a principal dancer with the Stuttgart Ballet, stars alongside newcomer Emil von Schönfels, whose recent credits include Babylon Berlin and Andreas Dresen’s The Legend Of Timm Thaler Or The Boy Who Sold His Laughter. Stever was one of the contributors to the omnibus film Germany 09: 13 Short Films About The State Of The Nation, which played out of competition at the 2009 Berlinale.
Contact: Reel Suspects

Happiness (Kaz)

Dir Askar Uzabayev
This film from Kazakh director Uzabayev (Zhol, Daughter-In-Law Is Also Human) deals with cycles of domestic violence in a border town in Kazakhstan. The daughter of a mother who has suffered several decades of abuse from her alcoholic husband is about to get married, potentially falling into the same situation. It is a step up for Uzabayev in terms of international profile: although his films have enjoyed local success, this is the first to screen in a major festival. Happiness was produced by Anna Katchko.
Contact: Anna Katchko, Tandem Production 

Klondike (Ukr-Turkey)

Dir Maryna Er Gorbach
Er Gorbach’s fifth film, which is about a Ukrainian family living on the border of Russia during the start of the war, is her first to play the Berlinale. The director’s last feature, Omar And Us (2019), was well received on the international festival circuit, picking up prizes including a jury award at Warsaw. Klondike debuted at Sundance and has its European premiere in Panorama. The film is a co-production between Kedr Film and Protim Video, which has produced all of Er Gorbach’s pictures, and is based around true events, including the shooting down of Malaysia Airlines passenger jet MH17 in 2014.
Contact: Mehmet Bahadir Er, Protim

A Love Song (US)

Dir Max Walker-Silverman
Walker-Silverman’s debut feature centres around two childhood sweethearts who, now much older and widowed, reconnect one night while camping. The film stars Dale Dickey and Wes Studi, and was produced by Fit Via Vi and Cow Hip Films. Walker-Silverman previously directed shorts Chuj Boys Of Summer (a special jury award at SXSW 2021) and 2019’s Lefty/Righty. A Love Song makes its international debut in Panorama after premiering at Sundance.
Contact Julie Chappell, Cinetic Media (North America); Films Boutique (RoW)

Lullaby (Sp)

Dir Alauda Ruiz de Azua
Spanish shorts filmmaker Ruiz de Azua makes her feature debut with Lullaby, starring Laia Costa (who headed Sebastian Schipper’s Berlin 2015 Competition title Victoria) as a new mother who returns to her parents’ house for support. Previously titled Five Wolf Cubs (Cinco Lobitos), the film took part in the second edition of ECAM’s Incubator and won best project at Ventana Cine­Mad in 2019. It is a co-production between Encanto Films, Sayaka Producciones and Buenapinta Media, and Bteam Pictures will distribute in Spain.
Contact: Latido Films

Nobody’s Hero (Fr)

Dir Alain Guiraudie
Best known internationally for 2013 gay-cruising drama Stranger By The Lake, director and novelist Guiraudie is one of the wilder cards of French art cinema, with films that flout narrative expectations and explore sexual desire in diverse permutations. Selected as Panorama’s opener, Guiraudie’s first film since 2016’s Staying Vertical has a cast including Noémie Lvovsky and La Belle Epoque’s Doria Tillier, in a story about a group of people caught up in a terrorist attack in Clermont-Ferrand. Charles Gillibert (Annette, Bergman Island) produces for CG Cinema. Les Films du Losange will distribute in France, and also handles international sales.
Contact: Les Films du Losange

Northern Skies Over Empty Space (Mex)

Dir Alejandra Marquez Abella
Abella’s third feature after Toronto premieres Semana Santa in 2015 and Las Ninas Bien in 2018 centres on a once-renowned hunter who must take action when he is threatened with the loss of his ranch and his father’s legacy. Gerardo Trejoluna, Paloma Petra, Juan Daniel Garcia Trevino and Mayra Hermosillo star in the latest work from Abella, one of Mexico’s leading lights in the Ya Es Hora movement — her country’s equivalent to Time’s Up that launched at Mexico’s 2019 Ariel Awards with a call for zero tolerance for gender violence, gender parity in the workplace, and more stories told from the female perspective.
Contact: Adán Pérez, Agencia Bengala 

Somewhere Over The Chemtrails (Czech)

Dir Adam Koloman Rybansky
The feature debut of Czech filmmaker Rybansky, who co-wrote the screenplay with Lukas Csicsely, contends with the aftermath of an accident during a village Easter fair, and its effect on a pair of volunteer firefighters. Eva Pavlickova and Pavel Vacha produce for Czech company Bratri, with co-producing partners FAMU, Czech Television, freeSAM and Magiclab. The film will be distributed locally by Bontonfilm.
Contact: Pluto Film

Swing Ride (It-Switz)

Dir Chiara Bellosi
This is Bellosi’s second film and second time in Berlin — her feature debut Ordinary Justice played Generation 14plus in 2020. Swing Ride is produced by Carlo Cresto-Dina’s tempesta — the company behind Alice Rohrwacher’s films — along with Swiss outfit tellfilm and with backing from Rai Cinema. It centres on an obese adolescent girl who becomes smitten with a transvestite who runs a fairground carousel across the road.
Contact: Catia Rossi, Vision Distribution 

Talking About The Weather (Ger)

Dir Annika Pinske

Pinske’s debut feature, which also marks her graduation from Berlin’s German Film & Television Academy (DFFB), centres on a woman entangled in contradictions in her quest for independence. The co-production between DFFB, local broadcaster rbb and New Matter Films was able to draw on the services of filmmaker Maren Ade as a script consultant; Pinske was Ade’s personal assistant during the production of Toni Erdmann, and that film’s star Sandra Hüller also appears here in a supporting role.
Contact: Films Boutique

 

Taurus (US)

Dir Tim Sutton
Sutton returns to Berlin after his 2020 feature Funny Face with the story of a troubled rising musician looking for inspiration while dark distractions lie along the way. Colson Baker (aka rapper Machine Gun Kelly) stars alongside his real-life partner Megan Fox, Maddie Hasson, Scoot McNairy and Ruby Rose. Anonymous Content handles worldwide sales on the Rivulet Films, Source Management + Production drama.

Contact: Nick Shumaker, Anonymous Content 

Una Femmina — The Code Of Silence (It)

Dir Francesco Costabile
Part of southern Italy’s new cinematic wave, Costabile has set his debut feature in his native Calabria. Based on a book by investigative journalist Lirio Abbate about female victims of violence in families that belong to the region’s home-grown mafia, the ’Ndrangheta, it centres on a young woman who rebels against the fate decreed for her. The film was produced by Naples-based O’Groove and Palermo’s Tramp Limited.
Contact: Micaela Fusco, Intramovies 

Until Tomorrow (Iran-Fr-Qat)

Dir Ali Asgari

Sadaf Asgari (Yalda, A Night Of Forgiveness) plays a young single mother who turns to desperate measures to hide her illegitimate child from her parents when they pay a visit. This is the second feature from Iranian filmmaker Asgari after Disappearance, which followed a couple’s desperate struggle to find vital medical treatment. That film had its world premiere in Venice’s Horizons sidebar in 2017 and also played in Toronto’s Discovery section. Asgari is an alumnus of the Berlinale Talent Campus’s 2013 intake.
Contact: MPM Premium

Working Class Heroes (Ser)

Dir Milos Pusic

Actress Jasna Djuricic will be a selling point for Pusic’s third feature, having claimed the best actress prize at the 2021 European Film Awards, as well as at several film festivals, for her performance in Jasmila Zbanic’s Oscar-nominated Quo Vadis, Aida?. Working Class Heroes also stars Boris Isakovic and deals with corruption, embezzlement and the abuse of illegal construction workers. The film blends documentary-style drama with aspects of a thriller; the screenplay was developed with Berlinale Talents’ Script Station.
Contact: Heretic

Panorama documentaries

Bettina (Ger)

Dir Lutz Pehnert
Four years after the premiere of Partisan, his co-directed portrait of Berlin’s Volksbühne theatre under controversial artistic director Frank Castorf, documentary filmmaker Pehnert returns with a biography of 74-year-old singer-songwriter Bettina Wegner. The film is the latest collaboration between Pehnert and Susanne Schimk’s Berlin-based solo:film after they worked together on Partisan and episodes of documentary series Geheimnisvolle Orte, Berlin — Schicksalsjahre Einer Stadt, and Lebensläufe: Jutta Hoffmann.
Contact: solo:film

Brainwashed: Sex‑Camera-Power (US)

Dir Nina Menkes
Menkes builds on ‘Sex and Power: the visual language of cinema’, a talk she delivered at film festivals around the world in 2018, and uses more than 175 clips from iconic Holly­wood films to reveal the misogyny behind the traditional visual language of cinema. Joey Soloway, Julie Dash and Eliza Hittman are among the talking heads on the film, which has its international premiere in Panorama after bowing first at Sundance. It has been 12 years since Menkes’ last feature Dissolution, which explored violence in Israeli society.
Contact John McGrath, UTA 

Dreaming Walls (Bel-Fr-Neth-Swe)

Dirs Amelie van Elmbt, Maya Duverdier
Patti Smith and Andy Warhol once graced its corridors, and now Manhattan’s Chelsea Hotel prepares to open its doors again after eight years of renovations. Duverdier’s feature directorial debut, and van Elmbt’s third film after Headfirst and The Elephant And The Butterfly, explores the building’s journey from hub of 1960s counterculture to luxury hotel. The film received support from Eurimages co-production funding, and is produced by Clin d’Oeil Films, Media International, Les Films de l’Oeil Sauvage, Basalt Film and Momento Film.
Contact Dogwoof

Into My Name (It)

Dir Nicolo Bassetti
Bassetti specialises in borderlands: it was his project and book on Rome’s outer ring-road that inspired Gianfranco Rosi to make Sacro GRA, winner of Venice’s Golden Lion in 2013. He later turned director himself, and in his second feature-length documentary follows four Bologna-based friends who have all transitioned to identifying as male. The film is produced by the director’s own Nuovi Paesaggi Urbani with Milan-based Art of Panic; Canadian actor/producer Elliot Page came on board as executive producer a few weeks before the film’s Berlinale premiere.
Contact: Art of Panic

 

Love, Deutschmarks And Death (Ger)

Dir Cem Kaya
After his homage to the golden era of popular Turkish cinema in 2014 doc Remake, Remix, Rip-Off, Kaya’s latest film uses archive footage to showcase the music of Turkish guest workers, their children and grandchildren in Germany. Filmfaust co-produces with Film Five and broadcasters WDR/Arte and rbb. The documentary was co-written by one of the film’s producers Mehmet Akif Büyükatalay, who won the GWFF best first feature award for his debut Oray at the 2019 Berlinale.
Contact: Florian Schewe, Film Five 

Myanmar Diaries (Neth-Myan-Nor)

Dir The Myanmar Film Collective
Ten anonymous Burmese directors, in collaboration with Myanmar citizens, document the events that followed the military coup in February 2021. Myanmar Diaries is a collection of short films that tell personal stories and was produced by Netherlands-based Zindoc, the production company behind Burmese shorts Letter To San Zaw Htway, which premiered at IDFA in 2021, and Sad Film, which played out of competition at Venice last year.
Contact: Autlook Film Sales

Nelly & Nadine (Swe-Bel-Nor)

Dir Magnus Gertten
Swedish director Gertten returns to the subject of concentration-camp survivors — he previously won prizes at Göteborg, Hamburg and Thessaloniki with the similarly themed Every Face Has A Name (2015). Nelly & Nadine unearths the long-hidden story of a love affair between Belgian opera singer Nelly Mousset-Vos and fellow prisoner Nadine Hwang, which started on Christmas Eve, 1944, in the Ravensbrück concentration camp. Nelly’s granddaughter Sylvie delves into her grandmother’s previously unseen archives to learn about her life-long love story.
Contact: Rise And Shine World Sales

No Simple Way Home (Kenya-S Sud-S Afr)

Dir Akuol de Mabior
Filmmaker de Mabior is the daughter of John Garang de Mabior, the former commander-in-chief of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army and the first vice president of Sudan, who died in a helicopter crash in 2005. Here, de Mabior follows her mother, politician Rebecca Nyandeng de Mabior, as she becomes one of the country’s vice-presidents. No Simple Way Home is produced by Lightbox Africa, and forms part of the Generation Africa documentary project led by South Africa non-profit organisation Steps.
Contact: Don Edkins, Steps

No U-Turn (Nigeria-S Afr-Fr-Ger)

Dir Ike Nnaebue
The debut feature from Nigeria’s Nnaebue retraces the steps he took as a young man trying to flee to Europe. No U-Turn received production funding from the Berlinale’s World Cinema Fund in 2020, and is a co-production between France’s Elda Productions, Nigeria’s Passion 8 Communication and South Africa’s Steps.
Contact Don Edkins, Steps

We, Students! (Cent Afr Rep-Fr-DRC-Saudi)

Dir Rafiki Fariala
In his debut feature, Democratic Republic of Congo-born Fariala examines everyday life for his friends at the University of Bangui in the Central African Republic. Daniele Incalcaterra and Boris Lojkine of Makongo Films produce, alongside Unité and Kiripi Films, with backing from France’s World Cinema fund, the Deental-ACP co-production programme and the Red Sea Fund. The project took part in Venice’s Final Cut post-production initiative and won the Freestudios award at Visions du Réel’s 2021 industry awards.
Contact: The Party Film Sales

• Berlin 2022: Screen’s guide to the Competition titles