Nabil Alani – Berlin Film Festival 2024
Non-fiction filmmaking emerged victorious at this year’s awards ceremony, which was rich with significant historical milestones, passionate political assertions, and repeated calls for a ceasefire in Gaza.
At the Berlin Film Festival awards, French-Senegalese filmmaker Mati Diop made history as the first Black director to win the prestigious Golden Bear for her innovative and powerful documentary “Dahomey.” She received the award from Lupita Nyong’o, marking another historic moment as Nyong’o was the first Black individual to chair the festival’s Competition jury. This striking image symbolizes progress, encapsulating an event filled with fervent remarks against war and social injustice.
Following the success of French filmmaker Nicolas Philibert, who won the Golden Bear last year for “On the Adamant,” “Dahomey” became the second consecutive documentary to earn the top prize. However, it stands out as a uniquely unconventional choice, starting with its runtime of just 67 minutes, making it the shortest film to win the Golden Bear since James Algar’s documentary short “In Beaver Valley” in 1951, the festival’s inaugural year. Diop, who transitioned from acting to directing after her acclaimed debut feature “Atlantics” at Cannes in 2019, infuses her film with profound historical and political insights as it chronicles France’s 2021 return of 26 ancient artifacts from the Kingdom of Dahomey to Benin, addressing the wrongs of 19th-century colonialism.
With two major Euro festival awards for her first two films, both diverse in style, Diop secures her status as a prominent international auteur. Mubi announced the acquisition of “Dahomey” for several regions, including North America and the U.K. Variety’s Jessica Kiang was among many critics impressed by Diop’s sophomore film, stating: “Inserting an inquisitive, imaginative intelligence into this key moment in the troubled timeline of post-imperial cultural politics, Diop crafts her superb, short but potent hybrid doc as a slim lever that cracks open the sealed crate of colonial history, revealing a hundred associated erasures and injustices.”
In an emotional and meticulously crafted speech, Diop expressed that the award “not only honors me, but also the entire visible and invisible community that the film represents.” She elaborated: “The first time I contemplated what restitution might look like, I heard a sound, a frequency, something trembling like an earthquake…it was the sound of a wall collapsing, a wall of silence, a wall of denial, that we all can and must work together to dismantle. To rebuild, restitution is essential. And what does restitution mean? It means achieving justice.” She concluded by dedicating her award to “all the women and men who have paved the way, and to those who today help make our story, our history, our unique beauty, and our strength known.”
In a ceremony primarily characterized by world cinema, English-speaking actors received the festival’s two gender-neutral acting awards. Former Marvel star Sebastian Stan won Best Leading Performance for his remarkable role in U.S. director Aaron Schimberg’s thought-provoking black comedy “A Different Man.” Stan portrays a man with neurofibromatosis whose life unravels after receiving a miraculous cure, becoming the first male performer to win at Berlin since the festival decided to eliminate gender separation in its acting awards three years ago. During his acceptance, he expressed gratitude to the jury for acknowledging “a narrative about acceptance, identity, and self-truth, as well as disfigurement and disability—subjects often overlooked due to our biases and discomfort.”
Two-time Oscar nominee Emily Watson received the supporting award for her haunting role in the festival opener “Small Things Like These,” where she plays a mother superior hiding Magdalene laundry abuses in 1980s Ireland. While accepting her award, the British actress thanked her co-star Cillian Murphy, who lead and produced the film, for including her in his passionate project. “I had the privilege of witnessing Cillian Murphy’s unraveling, and it was truly an honor,” she shared. “He had a dream that I would be in the movie, and here I am.”While many winners tackled significant themes, the jury also recognized filmmakers who opted for a lighter, more whimsical style. Veteran Korean director Hong Sangsoo, who competed at Berlin three years in a row from 2020 to 2022 and won awards each time, triumphed once again, receiving the Grand Jury Prize (the festival’s second-highest honor) for his light-hearted, elliptical character comedy “A Traveler’s Needs.” The film features Isabelle Huppert as a Frenchwoman mysteriously lost in Seoul. In his typically witty acceptance speech, Hong remarked, “I’d like to thank the jury — I don’t know what you saw in the film. I’m curious to know. It’s too much.”
However, it was the quirky French auteur Bruno Dumont who stole the show at the ceremony, accepting the Jury Prize for his unconventional and critically polarizing science-fiction farce “The Empire.” In a nod to current industry anxieties, Dumont humorously accepted his award using A.I. technology, letting a synthetic voice deliver his speech through his phone, echoing his sentiments twice. “A cinema film has no sex, a cinema film has no skin colour, a cinema film is a cinema film,” the voice proclaimed — a statement hard to dispute. Interestingly, Dumont’s film wasn’t the most bizarre to win a prize; Best Director was awarded to Dominican filmmaker Nelson Carlos De Los Santos Arias for his experimental work “Pepe,” a loosely based tale of a rogue hippopotamus escaping Pablo Escobar’s estate, which Kiang described as “an uncategorizably odd journey down the river of [the director’s] noodling, needling imagination.”
The jury, led by Lupita Nyong’o and including directors Christian Petzold, Albert Serra, Brady Corbet, Ann Hui, actor Jasmine Trinca, and Ukrainian author Oksana Zabuzhko, also awarded the Best Screenplay to German director Matthias Glasner for his intense three-hour family drama “Dying,” while Austrian cinematographer Martin Gschlacht received the Outstanding Artistic Contribution award for his painterly work in the historical psychodrama “The Devil’s Bath.”
“Dahomey” wasn’t the only documentary to win the top prize in its category; Guillaume Cailleau and Ben Russell’s film “Direct Action” topped the Encounters competition. This dynamic examination of a collective of French environmental activists, labeled as “eco-terrorists” by the authorities they oppose, also received a special mention from the Berlinale Documentary Award jury.
The documentary prize was narrowly taken by one of the evening’s most relevant winners: “No Other Land,” a harrowing exploration of Palestinian life under Israeli occupation, created by a four-member Palestinian-Israeli collective. Juror Thomas Heise described it as revealing “the inhuman, ignorant politics of the Israeli government that intentionally wreak havoc.” He added that “bearing witness and doing this responsibly and precisely — that is the true basis of any documentary film.” In his acceptance speech, Palestinian subject and co-director Basel Adra stated, “It’s hard for me to celebrate when there are tens of thousands of my people being slaughtered in Gaza,” urging other nations to “respect the UN calls and stop sending weapons to Israel.”
This win and accompanying speech embodied the evening’s sentiments, as numerous winners and jurors leveraged their platforms to advocate for a ceasefire in Gaza. American director Eliza Hittman, part of the Best First Feature jury, paraphrased Mark Twain in her presentation, emphasizing her Jewish identity alongside her anti-war stance: “There is no just war, and the more people try to convince themselves there’s a just war, the more they commit a grotesque act of self-deception.”
Such remarks resonated strongly at the conclusion of a festival that faced criticism for not taking an official stance on the conflict, yet invited films and talents inclined to speak out. Accepting her award, Emily Watson expressed what many observers felt, stating, “Being in the quivering presence of so many properly angry young filmmakers is just amazing.” The prevalence of documentary filmmaking at this year’s festival highlighted a restless energy in the industry, reflecting a reluctance to retreat into escapism as artists confronted their roles and privileges, contemplating how best to wield them.
Full list of winners:
COMPETITION
· Golden Bear for Best Film: “Dahomey,” Mati Diop
· Silver Bear Grand Jury Prize: “A Traveler’s Needs,” Hong Sangsoo
· Silver Bear Jury Prize: “The Empire,” Bruno Dumont
· Silver Bear for Best Director: “Pepe,” Nelson Carlos De Los Santos Arias
· Silver Bear for Best Leading Performance: “A Different Man,” Sebastian Stan
· Silver Bear for Best Supporting Performance: “Small Things Like These,” Emily Watson
· Silver Bear for Best Screenplay: “Dying,” Matthias Glasner.Silver Bear for Outstanding Artistic Contribution: “The Devil’s Bath,” Martin Gschlacht, cinematography
ENCOUNTERS
· Best Film: “Direct Action,” Guillaume Cailleau and Ben Russell
· Best Director: “Cidade; Campo,” Juliana Rojas
· Special Jury Award: (ex aequo) “The Great Yawn of History,” Aliyar Rasti; “Some Rain Must Fall,” Qiu Yang
BERLINALE DOCUMENTARY AWARD
· Best Documentary: “No Other Land,” Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor
· Special Mention: “Direct Action,” Guillaume Cailleau and Ben Russell
GWFF BEST FIRST FEATURE
· Best First Feature: “Cu Li Never Cries,” Phạm Ngọc Lân
BERLINALE SHORTS
· Golden Bear: “An Odd Turn,” Francisco Lezama
· Silver Bear: “Remains of the Hot Day,” Wenqian Zhang
· Special Mention: “That’s All From Me,” Eva Könnemann
Awards previously announced:
PANORAMA AWARDS
· Panorama Audience Award: “Memories of a Burning Body,” Antonella Sudasassi Furniss
· Second Prize: “Crossing,” Levan Akin
· Third Prize: “All Shall Be Well,” Ray Yeung
· Panorama Documentary Audience Award: “No Other Land,” Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor
· Second Prize: “My Stolen Planet,” Farahnaz Sharifi
· Third Prize: “Teaches of Peaches,” Philipp Fussenegger, Judy Landkammer
GENERATION AWARDS
Generation International Jury
· Grand Prix for Best Film in Generation 14plus: “Who By Fire,” Philippe Lesage
· Special Mention: “Maydegol,” Sarvnaz Alambeigi
· Special Prize for Best Short Film in Generation 14plus: “A Bird Flew,” Leinad Pájaro De la Hoz
· Special Mention: “Songs of Love and Hate,” Saurav Ghimire
· Grand Prix for Best Film in Generation Kplus: “Reinas,” Klaudia Reynicke
· Special Mention: “Through Rocks and Clouds,” Franco García Becerra
· Special Prize for Best Short Film in Generation Kplus: “A Summer’s End Poem,” Lam Can-zhao
· Special Mention: “Uli,” Mariana Gil Ríos
Youth Jury Generation 14plus
· Crystal Bear for Best Film: “Last Swim,” Sasha Nathwani
· Special Mention: “She Sat There Like All Ordinary Ones,” Qu Youjia
· Crystal Bear for Best Short Film: “Cura Sana,” Lucía G. Romero
· Special Mention: “Lapso,” Caroline Cavalcanti
Children’s Jury Generation Kplus
· Crystal Bear for Best Film: “It’s Okay!,” Kim Hye-young
· Special Mention: “Young Hearts,” Anthony Schatteman
· Crystal Bear for Best Short Film: “Butterfly,” Florence Miailhe
· Special Mention: “Soukun,” Dina Naser
INDEPENDENT JURY PRIZES
Ecumenical Jury Prizes
· Competition: “My Favorite Cake,” Maryam Moghaddam and Behtash Sanaeeha
· Panorama: “Sex,” Dag Johan Haugerud
· Forum: “Maria’s Silence,” Dāvis Sīmanis
· Special Mention: “Intercepted,” Oksana Karpovych
FIPRESCI Jury Prizes
· Competition: “My Favorite Cake,” Maryam Moghaddam and Behtash Sanaeeha
· Encounters: “Sleep With Your Eyes Open,” Nele Wohlatz
· Panorama: “Faruk,” Aslı Özge
· Forum: “The Human Hibernation,” Anna Cornudella Castro
Teddy Awards
· Best Feature Film: “All Shall Be Well,” Ray Yeung
· Best Documentary/Essay Film: “Teaches of Peaches,” Philipp Fussenegger, Judy Landkammer
· Best Short Film: “Grandmamauntsistercat,” Zuza Banasińska
· Jury Award: “Crossing,” Levan Akin
· Special Teddy Award: Lothar Lambert
CICAE Art Cinema Award
· Panorama: “Sex,” Dag Johan Haugerud
· Forum: “Shahid,” Narges Kalhor
Guild Film Prize: “Dying,” Matthias Glasner
Label Europa Cinemas: “Sex,” Dag Johan Haugerud
Caligari Film Prize: “Shahid,” Narges Kalhor
Peace Film Prize: “Favoriten,” Ruth Beckermann
Amnesty International Film Award: “The Strangers’ Case,” Brandt Andersen
Heiner Carow Prize: “Ivo,” Eva Trobisch
AG-Kino Gilde Cinema Vision 14Plus: “Last Swim,” Sasha Nathwani
· Special Mention: “Disco Afrika: A Malagasy Story,” Luck Razanajaona
OTHER PRIZES
· Berliner Morgenpost Readers’ Jury Award: “Dying,” Matthias Glasner
· Tagesspiegel Readers’ Jury Award: “A Family,” Christine Angot
DEVELOPMENT AWARDS
· Kompagnon Fellowship: “The Shore,” Vladimir Beck; “Traversée,” Tizian Stromp Zargari
· Artekino International Award: “Ich bin Marika,” Hajni Kis
· Eurimages Co-Production Development Award: “Screaming Girl,” Antonio Lukich
· VFF Talent Highlight Award: “Silence Sometimes,” Álvaro Robles
· Honorable Mentions: “Astana Internet Stars,” Assel Aushakimova; “More Than a
