Berlinale honorary Golden Bear winner Tilda Swinton addressed her presence at the festival in the wake of calls by some in the film community for a boycott in relation to the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.
Swinton was asked by an Israeli journalist during a press conference today (February 14) on her position on the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement, which works to end international support for Israel’s oppression of Palestinians, and is one of the organisations that has publicly called for a boycott of this year’s Berlinale.
She answered: “I’m a great admirer of and have a great deal of respect for BDS. I think about it a lot. I am here today and yesterday and tomorrow and the next day because I decided to come. I decided it was more important for me to come. I was given, thanks to the festival, a platform which I decided in a personal moment was potentially more useful to all our causes than me not turning up. It was a judgement call and a personal judgement call, that I take full responsibility for [it]. “
“What we’re all up against is this feelings of powerlessness,” she continued. “Boycotting is very often the most powerful thing we can do.”
She also specified she is not just concerned with the situation in Gaza, but that ”all the wars concern all of us.”
The boycott calls began last year in relation to concerns over the festival and Germany’s relationship with freedom of speech and the German government’s support for Israel.
She also spoke about her future plans. “I’m not shooting a film for the rest of this year,” said Swinton, who added that she plans to develop projects back in her home of Scotland, some related to cinema, some not.
“I can’t say what it is… but I need time,“ she said. “Filmmaking is a merciless mistress.”
Swinton senses a shift in the industry since the pandemic, owing to concerns around film financing. “That feeling of smash and grab and insecurity around finance has been really strenuous for us all. I need a break, so I’m going to have one.”
Swinton is an Oscar-winning UK actress whose films include We Need To Talk About Kevin, The Room Next Door and Michael Clayton, for which she won her best supporting actress Oscar.
She received the honorary Golden Bear for lifetime achievement at last night’s opening ceremony (February 13), in which she gave an impassioned speech, stating: “State-perpetrated and internationally enabled mass murder is currently actively terrorising more than one part of our world” and praising the Berlinale as “the great independent state of cinema”.
Swinton has been closely linked to the Berlinale across her career. It was the first festival she attended, in 1986 with her first film role in Derek Jarman’s Silver Bear winner Caravaggio.
She served as the president of the international jury in 2009 and starred in 26 films that have been programmed at the festival, among them The Beach (2000), Derek (2008), Julia (2008), The Garden (1991) and Last And First Men (2020).
Upcoming is Edward Berger’s Netflix feature The Ballad Of A Small Player which she shot this summer in Macao.
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