Gabriel Mascaro’s The Blue Trail is the winner of this year’s Berlin jury grid with an average score of 3.4 as Kateryna Gornostai’s Timestamp, Hong Sangsoo’s What Does Nature Say To You and Lionel Baier’s The Safe House complete the entries.
The Blue Trail stars Denise Weinberg in a dystopian fable following a 77-year-old who embarks on a journey through the Amazon. It received four four-stars (excellent) and five three-stars (good) and beats last year’s joint winners My Favourite Cake and The Devil’s Bath with 3.1. In the official Berlin award ceremony, the film received the Silver Bear grand jury prize and Ecumenical jury prize.
Meanwhile, Timestamp and What Does Nature Say To You both landed with a solid 2.7.
Gornostai’s documentary Timestamp received one four-star from Anton Dolin (Meduza, international) while the rest of the ratings comprised three- and two-stars. The film centres on schooling in Ukraine during the days of the Russian invasion.
Sangsoo’s latest Berlin entry scored two four-stars, followed by mostly three- and two-stars with Paolo Bertolin (Cinematografo, Italy) giving it just one-star (poor). The score matches that of the Korean filmmaker’s 2020 entry The Woman Who Ran but is behind his 2017 title On The Beach At Night Alone which scored an average of 3.
The final title to land on this year’s grid was The Safe House from the Swiss filmmaker which received 2.1 from the critics. The Second World War comedy was met with three three-stars and five two-stars but Martin Horyna (Cinepur, Czech Republic) gave it zero stars (bad).
With The Blue Trail taking the top spot, second place went to Radu Jude’s Kontinental ’25 on 3.1 – the only other film this year to score higher than three.
The Berlin jury awarded Dag Johan Haugerud’s Dreams (Sex Love) the Golden Bear. The Norwegian filmmaker’s third entry in his Sex Love Dreams trilogy received a decent 2.6 from the critics.
The lowest-scoring title on the grid was Reflection In A Dead Diamond on 1.7, followed closely by Rebecca Lenkiewicz’s Hot Milk on 1.8.
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