The Berlin Film Festival has announced its top honours for 2018. Check out the winning films and what they’re about, as we’re very likely to see a handful of these titles popping back up later in the year.
Golden Bear for Best Film & Best First Feature:
Touch Me Not, written & directed by Adina Pintilie
Romanian filmmaker Adina Pintilie took home top honours with her very first narrative feature, a faux documentary following a middle-aged Englishwoman exploring her alternative sexual desires.
Silver Bear Grand Jury Prize:
Twarz (Mug), co-written & directed by Małgorzata Szumowska
After a terrible accident, a man struggles with identity issues as he becomes the first person in Poland to receive a face transplant.
Silver Bear Alfred Bauer Prize & Best Actress:
The Heiresses, written & directed by Marcelo Martinessi
In her first credited performance on film, Ana Brun scored Best Actress playing an introvert whose longtime girlfriend ends up in prison for debt. Left on her own, she becomes a chauffeur for older, richer women.
Silver Bear for Best Director:
Wes Anderson for Isle of Dogs
Critical darling Wes Anderson claimed the Best Director trophy for his return to stop-motion nearly a decade after Fantastic Mr. Fox. Set in Japan, the film follows a boy in search of his dog who stumbles upon Trash Island – a place where all dogs of Megasaki City have been exiled.
Silver Bear for Best Actor:
Anthony Bajon for The Prayer
Anthony Bajon earned a Bear for his depiction of a young man struggling to kick his drug habit. Thus, he joins a Catholic commune with a diverse group of young men with the same issue, living together in a remote house on the French mountains.
Silver Bear for Best Screenplay:
Manuel Alcalá and Alonso Ruizpalacios for Museum
Touching on the 1985 true story, which saw the theft of numerous valuable Mayan, Mixtec and Zapotec artifacts, this Spanish heist films follows two students who impressively pull off the crime. It’s only afterwards they realise their actions were far more severe than they initially thought.
Silver Bear for Outstanding Artistic Contribution, Costume or Set Design:
Elena Okopnaya for Dovlatov
Set in 1971 Leningrad, the film follows Russian-Jewish writer Sergei Dovlatov and his manuscripts which depict first-hand accounts of the dilapidated state of the people and the country.
Berlinale Glashütte Original – Documentary Prize:
The Waldheim Waltz, Ruth Beckermann
A reconstructed account of how UN Secretary General Kurt Waldheim denied and debated the scandal surrounding his Nazi past.
Audi Short Film Award: Solar Walk, Réka Bucsi
Silver Bear for Short Film Jury Prize: Imfura, Samuel Ishimwe
Golden Bear for Best Short Film: The Men Behind the Wall, Ines Moldavsky
