EXBERLINER Issue 168, February 2018

WHAT’S ON — Berlinale 2018
Isle of Dogs
PREVIEW
Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot
Human, Space, Time and Human
On February 15, the Berlin Film Festival’s 68th edition takes over the city for
10 days of movies, politics and glamour, bringing a splash of “carpet red” to
our winter grey. Here’s our insider’s guide to the controversies, the celebrities
and the hidden treasures in the 350-film programme. By Paul O’Callaghan
The Berlinale tends to generate more handwringing
than flag-waving among jaded critics
and hard-to-please industry insiders. No matter
where you side on last November’s big scandal
– 79 high-profile directors publicly rebuking the
festival leadership and calling for a new start (see page
22) – there’s a sense among professionals that director
Dieter Kosslick is heading into this 2018 edition, his
second to last, with something to prove.
The rest of us, meanwhile, can still count on the
Berlinale to have us glowing with civic pride at the
bleakest time of year. Those who dismiss it as Cannes’
poor cousin often overlook the fact that the festivals
operate on entirely different terms – Berlin hosts
audiences 10 times as large as those of its elitist,
glamour-obsessed rival. Kosslick has been criticised
for his seemingly scattershot approach to curation,
but Berliners continue to lap up what the festival has
to offer – a smattering of red-carpet glitz and afterhours
hedonism, a healthy dose of politics and a vast,
thematically and geographically diverse programme.
At the very least, it looks like this year’s festival, which
boasts Berlin’s own Tom Tykwer as jury president, will
get off to a more auspicious start than in 2017, when
pedestrian biopic Django hit a resounding bum note on
opening night. This year, Berlinale veteran Wes Anderson
returns with Isle of Dogs, his second foray into stopmotion
animation after 2009’s Fantastic Mr. Fox. Aside
from looking rather delightful, the film delivers in terms
of raw star power, something conspicuously lacking last
year, with a stellar voice cast including Bryan Cranston,
Ed Norton, Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson.
While this hotly anticipated world premiere is undoubtedly
a coup, some of the other buzziest Englishlanguage
titles will be old news by the time they hit
Potsdamer Platz, having received world premieres at
Sundance a month earlier. This year’s batch of sloppy
seconds includes Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot
SECTION GUIDE
C: Competition
The 24 international
contenders for the
coveted Golden
Bear award.
P: Panorama
Arthouse gems by
international auteurs,
curated by auteurin-his-own-right
Wieland Speck.
F: Forum
Experimental,
avant-garde and
otherwise risky flicks
from little-known upand-comers.
G: Generation
Films that might be
youth-centric, but
definitely aren’t just
for kids.
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EXBERLINER 168