Outgoing Berlinale co-directors Carlo Chatrian and Mariette Rissenbeek discussed the reasons for their departure and reflected on their tenure at the festival during the announcement of the Competition and Encounters line-ups today.
Both Chatrian and Rissenbeek announced last year that they are stepping down after the 2024 edition when their five-year mandates at the festival come to an end. For its 2025 edition, the Berlinale will return to a single-director model under incoming director Tricia Tuttle, the former head of BFI London Film Festival.
Asked why he was leaving, Chatrian said: “It’s quite simple. Mariette and I had a mandate of five years. It is true that at the beginning I said that I was willing to go on because there was a shared will with the [German] Ministry [of Culture] to go on.
“But then the people who have the responsibility to see the future of the Berlinale thought this structure of two leaders was not the right one and I don’t consider myself able to run the festival alone. And that was the decision of the Ministry. So, it’s the end of a mandate and there will be a new person whom I think we both give our best to keep on the great tradition of this festival.”
Asked to sum up their time at the festival, Rissenbeek focused on managing the Berlinale through the pandemic. “My summary is that we had Berlinales in a pandemic time,” she said.
In 2021, a shortened festival took place online in March for industry and press followed by an in-person summer event for the public. The festival took place in 2022 at a reduced scale with strict hygiene measures, while events such as the European Film Market and Berlinale Talents went online only. “I think that was already the biggest achievement we had,” said Rissenbeek.
Chatrian said he was proud of his final selection, and previous editions. “If I look back at the previous selections – how the films have been received by the audience, by the press, how they have travelled throughout the world – I think we have achieved our goal which is to raise questions and to help people find their own place in this world. During the pandemic that was all the more necessary.”
He picked out one of his “most cheerful memories” as holding Berlinale Summer Special in 2021 in the midst of the pandemic.
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