“Hectic” barely begins to cover the start of the 36th TEDDY AWARD, but nothing makes us happier than running back and forth and preparing all the upcoming events and screenings for you!
Without further ado, here are today’s wonderful TEDDY premieres:
Scroll down to the bottom of the page to find the list of reruns. 🐻
Synopsis: Benedetta, 15, lives in rural Italy with her parents and her two little sisters. After work, her father enjoys tinkering with cars while her mother takes out her frustration on Benedetta. When a funfair sets up on the family’s doorstep, she meets a fairground worker named Amanda who lives a self-determined life and defies gender norms. Benedetta is immediately fascinated by the older Amanda’s self- confidence and independence, and school quickly fades into the background. The two barely talk; their cautious friendship is not one fuelled by grand emotions but rather by genial affection, curiosity and unspoken acknowledgement.
SCREENING TIMES:
13.02. / 16:00 Zoo Palast 1
13.02. / 18:25 Cubix 3 (Screening for industry professionals | With accreditation only)
Synopsis: A millennial death doula introduces us to the world of end-of-life care. With a matter-of-fact demeanor and intense physicality, she guides us into the largely uncharted waters of corpse care—practical, political, and spiritual. She performs her knowledge within a field of props that are the tools of her trade, kept in a “mobile corpse kit”—everyday items that she manipulates to profound use. The film, drawn from workshops, research, and interviews conducted with several end-of-life doulas from different cultural backgrounds, is a skill share, threaded with humor, grief, unknowing, and a desire for justice. The doula’s work encourages us to turn towards that which we strive so hard to avoid.
Synopsis: White Sands Crystal Foxes is an experimental film journey through the point of view of a young queer person who daydreams about the erotics of a world where humans are willfully in submission to nature, and foxes are the only mammals still able to procreate. In this speculative world, in heightened states of emotion, crystals form from human secretions, such as tears, cum, and piss, and are considered to be valuable sources of energy. Foxes are polyamorous creatures slowly becoming the dominant mammals populating the world. Holes are infinite portals, social architectures, thresholds, and energy conductors. Drawing connections between chemical warfare, climate change, sustainable energy, and queering time and space, Liz Rosenfeld transforms a 360° immersive environment (a planetarium) into a speculative future lexicon of flesh, holes, crystals, and foxes.
SCREENING TIMES:
13.02. / 21:30 Zeiss-Großplanetarium
RERUNS:
Bashtaalak sa’at (Shall I compare you to a summer’s day?) 13.02. / 18:00 Cubix 6
Dreaming Walls 13.02. / 12:00 Zoo Palast 2 13.02. / 13:35 Cubix 4 (Screening for industry professionals | With accreditation only)
A Love Song 13.02. / 13:00 International 13.02. / 16:00 Cubix 1 (Screening for industry professionals | With accreditation only)
Mars Exalté (Exalted Mars) 13.02. / 12:00 Cubix 6
Nel mio nome (Into My Name) 13.02. / 15:00 Zoo Palast 2
Sublime 13.02. / 11:15 Cubix 3 (Screening for industry professionals | With accreditation only) 13.02. / 15:30 Filmtheater am Friedrichshain
Le variabili dipendenti (The Dependent Variables) 13.02. / 17:30 Cubix 8
The third festival day is buzzing with lively events and especially with our delightful premieres – 9 taking place only today! We’ve comprised a list of all the premieres and reruns scheduled for today to make your life easier. Check them out below👇
As if that wasn’t eventful enough, keep an eye out for our TEDDY Talk: The TEDDY Winners Path through a Pandemic. The event will be broadcasted live at 4 PM (CET) at teddyaward.tv/live.
Synopsis: The camera hovers, lost in reverie as voices and sounds waft through the gutted rooms of a building. Archive footage is sometimes projected onto unplastered walls and at others used as a soundtrack as we continue our tour. This is the legendary Chelsea Hotel, famous as the preferred abode of New York’s bohemia from the 1950s to the 1980s. Here, bourgeois society’s misfits – sex workers, poets, queers and artists – were able to find cheap accommodation and form alliances. In this documentary, the remaining tenants from that era grant access to their flats and give us an insight into their lives. They are the focus of a film that interweaves the present with the ghosts of the past. The completion of eight years of luxury refurbishment ahead of the building’s reopening as a hotel is eagerly awaited by some residents and dreaded by others.
Synopsis: James Gregory Atkinson’s performative short film centers the history of the iconic Peacock Chair to interrogate contemporary social contexts and historical concepts of identities. The film engages the chair’s origins in forced prison labor in the Philippines, its status as an internationally traded “exotic” commodity, its use in portrait photography, and its associations with Black radical activists such as Huey P. Newton—to explore ideas of Black masculinities and resistance.
Synopsis: A remote lake in the North American landscape. The sand is yellow, the sky is blue and the mountains distant; there is nary a tree far and wide to provide shade. Faye is spending her days here in a trailer, with two books and a radio, leisurely birdwatching and stargazing. With her wiry build, wild blonde hair and hands that speak of a life of labour, she fits in perfectly here. Anything that breaks, she simply fixes; the only time she sits up and takes notice is when there is a knock at the door. Because Faye is waiting for Lito. Their connection goes way back to their youthful love for each other, but for some years now they have also shared the pain of loss – both are widowed. Max Walker-Silverman’s gentle, laconic film is about contemplative introspection, the power of love and the depths of melancholy. Dale Dickey’s portrayal of Faye is a touching mixture of inner strength and fragility, which is also reflected in the impressive natural scenery and a delicate soundtrack.
Synopsis: Four friends – Nic, Leo, Andrea and Raff – tell the stories of their gender transitions. Looking back on their childhood and youth, they share their personal memories and experiences. Even if they did not always conform to the social norms of femininity – all four were socialised as girls. Each of their gender biographies may be different, yet there are parallels. This helps them to understand each other and feel less alone. The discussions with partners, the choice of pronouns, the hormone therapy, decisions about surgery and dealing with the authorities – the processes are diverse, and lengthy. In the strictly binary world we live in, the decision to determine one’s own gender identity is a subversive act.
Synopsis: In his dreams, bathed in a brilliant glow, Manu and his best friend Felipe are inching closer and closer together, yet they never kiss. A confusing desire, as Manu is dating Azul, and the two are about to have sex for the first time. In Mariano Biasin’s Sublime, a niggling desire simmers beneath the surface of 16-year-old Manu’s everyday life, his emotional turmoil bubbling up and revealing itself in indirect ways – during his attempt to find the right chords for his latest lyrics and in his flights of melancholic introspection, at band practices with the rest of the guys or during supper with his parents. Cautiously, with increasing resignation, Manu keeps trying to solve the conundrum: how do you avoid losing something precious, when it’s the very thing tearing you up inside?
Synopsis: While their classmates endure the visit to the concert with pranks, Pietro and Tommaso secretly get closer to each other in the box. During the playing of Vivaldi’s composition, their lips touch. When Tommaso invites Pietro to his home shortly afterwards, the tension is still in the air. The desire, however, soon gives way to an ambiguity that particularly irritates the otherwise cautious Pietro. What did the kiss mean?
Synopsis: A city at dawn. Traffic is flowing like red and white blood cells. A man sleeps, enveloped in the darkness – he is beautiful, he is naked, it is hot. We will never know what he is dreaming. The sun rises and the façades of the skyscrapers begin to sparkle
Synopsis: In the shadow of a colonial past and a neo-capitalist present, Inti, Jai and Pauline are searching for their place in a world that was not made for them. As they roam the neighbourhood looking for somewhere to settle, they question their parents about faith, spirituality, roots and their experiences of migration. They decide to occupy an empty bank building in order to fill it with their memories, dreams and role play. A portrait of our time that oscillates between documentary, performance art and surrealism.
Synopsis: A Hollywood villa on a sultry summer night. The escort does what he was hired to do and gives his client the illusion he has paid for. “I’ll make you a star”, the customer says, before the tide turns abruptly and the power dynamics are unsettled. A revenge movie of the queer kind.
Every year we count the days until the next Berlinale and each year it’s worth the wait! To mark the second festival day, we’ve listed below today’s most fabulous film premieres that you definitely don’t want to miss.
For all the other screenings available today, scroll all the way down to the bottom of the page and enjoy them enough for us as well!
Synopsis: One journey begins in Graz, in April 2020, the director’s trip back to China in the midst of the lockdown: flight connections on a cracked phone screen, hazmat suits on the aeroplane, tape sealing the hotel room door. But it also intermingles with another earlier journey: the family trip from China to Myanmar to find out what happened to great-grandfather, who left in the 1940s and never came back. The director films both trips and everything around them too, that’s why it’s so hard to keep things apart, always the same fascination for patterns and textures, the same grainy video in black and white, the same eye for unlikely beauty, the same unflinching gaze.
SCREENING TIMES:
11.02. / 13:30 Kino Arsenal 1
11.02. / 16:10 Cubix 4 (Screening for industry professionals | With accreditation only)
Synopsis: The voice of opera singer Nelly resonates in the middle of Ravensbrück concentration camp. Nelly and Nadine met for the first time at Christmas in 1944. They found each other again after liberation and were to stay together for the rest of their lives. Today, Nelly’s granddaughter Sylvie is about to be confronted with her grandmother’s legacy, locked in a box. The photographs, Super 8 footage and audio recordings as well as the poetic and harrowing diary entries that she comes across describe not only her grandmother’s memories of the camp, but also tell the story of her life with Nadine – a relationship that was never referred to as such by the family.
SCREENING TIMES:
11.02. / 16:00 International
11.02. / 16:50 Cubix 2 (Screening for industry professionals | With accreditation only)
Synopsis: A glance leads to a smile, a smile to a rendezvous: every love story begins the same way. These narratives are stored in songs and poems and live on beyond their inevitable endings, as Shakespeare’s titular sonnet 18 also suggests. In Mohammad Shawky Hassan’s metafictional essay, a female narrator who wishes to tell the story of a love between two men encounters a polyamorous chorus of lovers, and this oft-told tale is multiplied. In Club Scheherazade, there is no protagonist, and every song has various versions. Heteronormative dramaturgy is challenged polyphonically and across a range of media: lovers ask each other about threesomes, Grindr contacts and past dates. Pop clichés are twisted, heartache permeates the men’s singing, and poems by Wadih Saadeh are read out while a lover’s dirty laundry is aired. The narrator mischievously tries for a happy ending as her characters exit the story. “If pain could be forgotten through words,” we hear at one point, “no lover would ever have to walk away wounded.”
Synopsis: Fourteen-year-old Balli is something of a misfit. He lives with his drug-addicted mother in a squalid house and is bullied by his classmates. A stepfather who “thought the gun wasn’t loaded” has left him with a glass eye. But then Balli meets three boys of his own age – Addi, Konni and Siggi – and a friendship gently develops. For the first time in his life, Balli finds that he is able to connect, especially with Addi, whose mother believes in “the subconscious”. Addi is fighting his own demons and, when his visions appear to indicate that Balli’s brutal stepfather can no longer be tolerated, the boys decide to act.
SCREENING TIMES:
11.02. / 15:30 Zoo Palast 1
11.02. / 16:10 Cubix 1 [Screening for industry professionals | With accreditation only]
RERUNS:
Peter von Kant 11.02. / 11:00 CinemaxX 9
Viens je t’emmène (Nobody’s Hero) 11.02. / 11:45 Cubix 2 (Screening for industry professionals | With accreditation only) 11.02. / 13:30 International
Friday 11 Feb 2022 – 6pm cet a TEDDY Jury Reception: The traditional introduction to our TEDDY AWARD Jury as Online talk Zsombor Bobák in conversation with this year’s TEDDY jury members Robert Moussa, Joanna Ostrowska, Faridah Gbadamosi & Pepe Ruiloba about their festivals, the TEDDY jury’s work and what a Queer Film Prize means to them.
Saturday 12 Feb 2022 – 4pm cet TEDDY Talk: The TEDDY Winners Path through a Pandemic Samuel Girma in conversation with Eliane Raheb & John Greyson A conversation between the winners of the past TEDDY AWARDS and how winning the TEDDY AWARD during the pandemic influenced their films path, plus what that path looked like during the second year of this ongoing pandemic. After the first online edition of the TEDDY, film programmer Samuel Girma will talk through what challenges and surprises confronted these filmmakers and their award winning films over the course of their festival tour.
Sunday 13 Feb.2022 – 4pm cet TEDDY Talk: Evolving Experimentation Toby Ashraf in conversation with Liz Rosenfeld, Mohammad Shawky Hassan & Gustavo Vinagre For filmmakers who challenge the norm, not just in story, but also in form; we speak with three filmmakers whose works will be presented within Forum and Forum Expanded on the importance of experimentation within Queer Cinema. From the development process to story dictating the form or vice versa. Moreover, the struggles involved in evolving this art form in storytelling.
Sunday 13 Feb 2022– 6pm cet DIRECTORS EXCHANGE: Motivations Nastaran Tajeri-Foumani in conversation with Idan Haguel, Alli Haapasalo & Antonio Marziale Three directors whose works screen within the 72nd Edition of the Berlinale meet and discuss the different motivations behind their respective films. From development through to post production, what role can hot topic issues play in a storyline and a characters motivation? How difficult is it to create complex characters within a socially critical work?
Monday 14 Feb 2022 – 6pm cet Queer Your Program: Online Speedy Film Pitches – (on pre-registration only) Moderator: Bartholomew Sammut Around 25 Filmmakers whose films are ready for distribution will present their projects within two-minute pitches to programmers, distributors and sales agents. Join in to find potentially your next opening night film.
Monday 14 Feb 2022 – 8pm cet Queer Industry Reception goes Online (on pre-registration only) Moderator: Bartholomew Sammut Introduction: Michael Stütz The annual gathering of industry professionals from the Queer Film Industry, from filmmakers to programmers, to distributors and sales agents. What normally happens in person with a wine in hand and scribbled nametags on shirts, will happen once more online. We shall continue to come together as a community, connect and network, chat about the year we had, the films we look forward to and also to have a little drink and some much needed time together.
Keeping in line with our yearslong tradition, we are going to prepare a new blog article for each day of the 72nd edition of the Berlinale to make sure you don’t miss out on any of your favorite LGBTQIA+ films premiering this year!
Starting today, you will find here all the information you may need about the upcoming TEDDY films — from the day and time to the location of the screening.
Keep an eye on our social media channels for more information about the forthcoming interviews and the latest film industry events.
Synopsis: The news of a terrorist attack in Clermont-Ferrand in France catches Isadora and Médéric in bed. Médéric, a likeable, unassuming man in his mid-thirties, has fallen head over heels in love with the older, married sex worker Isadora. The attack brings their lovemaking at the Hotel de France to an abrupt end. Sélim, a homeless young man of Arab origin, is given money and shelter by Médéric. But then the latter begins to suspect that Sélim might have been involved in the attack, and calls the police. In the meantime, Isadora’s husband turns up and starts to feel jealous. And so it is that Alain Guiraudie’s lively and sometimes turbulent carousel of characters begins to spin.
Synopsis: Peter von Kant is a successful film director. He lives with his assistant Karl, whom he likes to mistreat and humiliate. Sidonie is the great actor who was his muse for many years. She introduces him to Amir, a handsome young man of modest means. Peter falls in love with Amir on the spot and offers to share his apartment with him and help him break into the film industry. The plan works, but as soon as he acquires fame, Amir breaks up with Peter, leaving him alone to face his demons.
