GERMANY: Germany rolls out the red carpet for the Berlin Film Festival

Berlin was polishing its posters and rolling out the red carpet ready for the Berlinale Film Festival which opens on Thursday (February 8). The festival will open with a biopic about the French singer Edith Piaf which the event's director hopes will leave audiences happy and banish past memories of poorly-received opening films. Controversy over movies messages and a no-show from major stars have marred the opening nights of the Berlinale festival in recent years, but this year's festival has a broad mix of big Hollywood celebrities, foreign stars and art-house film products. Festival director Dieter Kosslick has said he is confident that Olivier Dahan's film about the life of the famous French chanteuse will be well-received, setting the tone for the 57th Berlinale. The guest-list dismisses criticism that the Berlinale -- which ranks alongside Venice and Cannes as one of the three major European film festivals -- lacks the power to draw in the big stars. Confirmed guests include actors-turned-directors Clint Eastwood and Robert De Niro as well as Jennifer Lopez, Antonio Banderas, Sharon Stone and Cate Blanchett. Golden-globe winner Blanchett stars in director Steven Soderbergh's "The Good German", which is also in the running for the Golden Bear. Co-star George Clooney plays a U.S. journalist in the black-and-white film who gets embroiled in a murder plot. The Good German" is already on release in the United States but gets its international premiere in Berlin, where it is set. Many of the 360 films consist of the more serious pictures for which the event has become known. One of the themes for 2007 is the struggle of the individual with his environment and the forces within it. "I don't expect too much drama, which could mean in fact that there is a lot of drama," said the Jury President, the writer and director Paul Schrader as he arrived in Berlin, "but I expect that things will run very smoothly." Competing for the festival's Golden Bear award are Germany's "Yella" about an unemployed woman escaping her unhappy marriage and a Belgian-British-German co-production "Irina Palm", starring British singer and actress Marianne Faithfull as a 50-year-old widow who unwittingly takes a job in a sex club. The Berlinale, unlike its rivals in Cannes and Venice, opens its doors to the public, making available several thousand tickets for the ordinary cinema-goers alongside special screenings for some 3,500 journalists and some several thousand film rights buyers. "I am looking forward to the film sin general, and to a bit of Hollywood, because then you see a few stars and a bit of glamour," said on film fan, Georg Kroemer. "I am not here because of the stars, I am looking forward to seeing films which don't make it into the cinemas, or if they do then much later," said another fan Lea. The film festival runs from February 8th to the 18th, giving Lea and Georg ten days in which to pack in the 360 films.

ITN Source | February 8, 2007

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