From February 16th to 26th this year the “Berlinale” takes place – every year a number of productions compete for film prizes such as “Golden Bear” or “Silver Bear for Best Director”. We list the best movies that focus on music.
“La Béte Dans La Jungle”
- by Patric Chiha, with Anaïs Demoustier, Tom Mercier, Béatrice Dalle, Martin Vischer, Sophie Demeyer
France / Belgium / Austria 2023
Content (berlinale.de):
“It begins in the late 1970s with dazzling nights in the club as a place of endless (im)possibility and timeless clockwork of a city. Here John and May are waiting for the extraordinary, everything-changing moment. Everything around them is noisy and in motion as they stand still. 25 years pass and they follow world events on the tube TV: Mitterrand’s term in office, the AIDS crisis, the fall of the Berlin Wall and 9/11. John’s obsessive looking out for the one big event turns into a monster, May into a suffering accomplice. From 1979 to 2004: from disco to techno. Fashion, movements and drugs in transition. Dancing against the time that is passing faster and faster. Lost among people, alone together, the two observe the world from the edge. If only it were love.”
“Love To Love You, Donna Summer”
- by Roger Ross Williams, Brooklyn Sudano
United States 2023
“The unusual story of disco queen Donna Summer, thrillingly told along with unpublished documents: film excerpts, home videos, photos, recordings and private audio recordings from all phases of life of the legendary artist, who made the dance floor tremble like no other. From the beginnings in Germany with Giorgio Moroder to later years, when Summer, burdened by the downside of her fame and emotional injuries, sought protection in spirituality and family life.
“TAR”
- by Todd Field, starring Cate Blanchett, Nina Hoss, Noémie Merlant, Adam Gopnik, Julian Glover
United States 2022
“The talented conductor Lydia Tár has made her way in the male-dominated classical music scene. She reached the high point of her career when she was appointed first chief conductor of a major German orchestra in Berlin. Between concert dates on both sides of the Atlantic, she is preparing an eagerly awaited recording of Gustav Mahler’s Fifth Symphony. But suddenly a shadow falls on her charismatic figure; her performance at the conductor’s podium suffers and her status falters. Previous life decisions, the consequences of which for a young musician and her own obsessions threaten to catch up with her again and lead to complications in the relationship with her concertmaster and partner (played by Nina Hoss). Tár endangers her career and the reputation of the whole orchestra.”
Joan Baez – I Am Noise
- by Karen O’Connor, Miri Navasky, Maeve O’Boyle, starring Joan Baez, Mimi Farina, Bob Dylan, David Harris
United States 2023
“A musician, civil rights leader and activist, Joan Baez has been on stage for over 60 years since her debut at the age of 18. For the now 82-year-old, the personal has always been political, and her friendship with Martin Luther King and pacifism have shaped her commitment. Starting from her farewell tour, Baez takes stock in this biography, in which she also confronts painful memories. Not only does she share her accomplishments, but she speaks openly about longstanding mental health issues and therapy, family, drugs, aging, and issues of guilt and forgiveness. And she also clarifies that during her relationship with the very young Bob Dylan, she used her celebrity to launch his career. Her disappointment at the subsequent estrangement from Dylan is palpable.”
“Kiss The Future”
- by Nenad Cicin-Sain, with Vesna Andree Zaimović, Senad Zaimović, Enes Zlatar, Alma Catal Hurem, Boris Siber
USA / Ireland 2023
“A film about the dangers of nationalism and about art as a means of intervention. Yugoslavia falls apart, Sarajevo is under siege; war is raging in Bosnia. The blockade lasts for years. Life becomes a reaction of defiance and rock and punk music becomes a source of inspiration, distracting from the daily nightmare of Serbian grenades and snipers. The local resistance inspires an American who is providing humanitarian aid in Sarajevo with a seemingly absurd idea: He asks the world-famous rock band U2 to draw public attention to the devastating war. The band agrees.”
“Adentro Mio Estoy Bailando – The Klezmer Project”
- by Leandro Koch, Paloma Schachmann, with Leandro Koch, Paloma Schachmann, Perla Sneh, Rebeca Yanover, César Lerner – Austria / Argentina 2023
“Frustrated Jewish wedding filmmaker Leandro doesn’t care about his family’s religion. When he falls in love with klezmer clarinetist Paloma, he invents a documentary film project so he can spend time with her. The film sends him on a journey across Eastern Europe in search of lost klezmer tunes that survived in the care of the Roma because they lived next door to the Jews before World War II.”
“SUBETE NO YORU WO OMOIDASU”
- by Yui Kiyohara, starring Kumi Hyodo, Minami Ohba, Ai Mikami, Guama Uchida, Tadashi Okuno
Japan 2022
“Tama New Town is a residential area in western Tokyo. It emerged in the mid-1960s when the cost of living in the capital skyrocketed. Multi-storey residential blocks, lots of greenery in the parks and common areas bear witness to a social vision that has meanwhile become historic. Director Yui Kiyohara, who guest-starred at Forum in 2018 with Our House, follows three female characters as they roam Tama New Town for a day in her latest feature film. The film thrives on the everyday: the appointment at the job center, the bus or bike ride, the joy of the early summer flora in the park and the ever-changing perspectives on the functional architecture. The paths of the three figures cross in a few places. Sometimes a synthesizer joins in by spitting out friendly creaking and rattling sounds.”
“Anus”
- by Anthony Lapia, starring Louise Chevillotte, Majd Mastoura, Natalia Wiszniewska, Killian Briot, Olivier Chantreau
France 2023
“It’s night in Paris. The driving bass of a music system roars through an underground car park. On the dance floor of a club, the revelers let themselves be carried away by techno, enveloped by smoke and light, communication is only with the body. When Félicie is danced to by her ex-girlfriend, she turns away. The music is quieter in the room next door. You strike up a conversation, take drugs or take a break before the uninhibited dancing continues. Here Félicie meets Saïd, who has just returned from his shift as a driver and is talking about the yellow vest protests. Félicie suggests he continue partying at her place while the other partygoers continue to lose themselves in the night.”
“Agent”
- by Nikolaj Lie Kaas, Nikolaj Lie Kaas, with Esben Smed, Selma Sol í Dali Pape, Julie Agnete Vang, Ina-Miriam Rosenbaum, Mathilde Arcel
Denmark 2023
“As an agent for music and film stars, Johan’s job is to solve his clients’ problems, whether professional or personal. He actually has enough of both himself. He shares custody with his ex-wife of ten-year-old daughter Tallulah, whose need for attention he disappoints every weekend visit. His boss, who is also his mother, keeps him on a short leash because of horrendous expense bills. And he still owes the local mafia boss a lot of money. It’s a good thing that a lucrative contract is imminent – as long as nothing unforeseen comes up.”
“If You Don’t Watch The Way You Move”
- by Kevin Jerome Everson, starring Derek “Dripp” Whitfeld Jr., Taymond “ChoSkii” Hughes, Jermaine “Country Blakk” Brown
United States 2023
“In ‘If You Don’t Watch the Way You Move’ Derek ‘Dripp’ Whitfeld Jr. and Taymond ‘ChoSkii’ Hughes of the music group BmE compose their latest composition ‘Shiesty’ and record it in the studio of Jermaine ‘Country Blakk’ Brown in Columbus, Mississippi; only to be interrupted by a John Cage score.”
music
- by Angela Schanelec, with Aliocha Schneider, Agathe Bonitzer, Marisha Triantafyllidou, Argyris Xafis, Frida Tarana
Germany / France / Serbia 2023
“A newborn boy is rescued in a night storm. Paramedic Elias takes him to his wife, they both call him Jon and raise him. As a young man, Jon is mugged and guilty of manslaughter. The victim… The prison officer Iro and he become a couple. The tape recorder plays baroque, playlist: Monteverdi, Bach, Pergolesi and others. The aesthetics of the music becomes the program. It reflects what is happening in a lucid, enigmatic, concretely abstract, lustfully ascetic way. In the baroque-postmodern cinema of Angela Schanelec, the formulas of the theory of affects and characters apply. An intellectual-sensual challenge that is addictive. Seeing blind.”
“OYOYO”
“In the unique cross-section, students from Chile, Guinea-Bissau, Mongolia, Cuba and Bulgaria talk about their decision to study in the GDR and about the challenges associated with life there. The film was shot entirely in the student residence. The director’s precise camera work and her ability to create a natural atmosphere in which intimate and open conversations about love, longings and dreams for the future of her protagonists could unfold organically give the film its special quality. It’s a look that comes from within. The interview scenes alternate with music by Silvio Rodríguez (Cuba) and Nara Leão (Brazil) as well as songs in Cape Verdean Creole.”
“She Came To Me”
- by Rebecca Miller, starring Peter Dinklage, Marisa Tomei, Joanna Kulig, Brian d’Arcy James, Anne Hathaway
United States 2023
“As if an opera composer in a creative crisis and a spirited tugboat captain with a penchant for amorous adventures weren’t enough to guarantee an eccentric plot, screenwriter and director Rebecca Miller expands the tableau of characters in her sixth feature film to include a psychiatrist who suffers from delusions of order and religious obsessions, as well as an ultra-conservative court stenographer and self-proclaimed prosecutor with a passion for historical reenactments. Two teenagers in love provide some balance. They are more level-headed and reflective than their adult environment, which indulges in its neuroses, obsessions and prejudices.”
More about the Berlinale
In 2023 the “Berlinale” will take place for the 73rd time. The heart of the event is the competition. On Saturday, February 25, the international jury will award prizes. The jury president is Kristen Stewart (USA), her colleagues are Golshifteh Farahani (Iran / France), Radu Jude (Romania), Francine Maisler (USA), Carla Simón (Spain) and Johnnie To (Hong Kong, China).
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