World Socialist Web Site

60th Berlin International Film Festival

Part 1: Roman Polanski’s The Ghost Writer, a new version of Metropolis, and other matters

By Stefan Steinberg, February 24, 2010

There was a dearth of substantial social and political films at the Berlinale, despite the biggest economic crisis since the 1930s. Nevertheless, a small number of the works on view made an attempt to...

Part 2: Moloch Tropical and Jew Suss: Rise and Fall

Part 3: Kanikosen: a Japanese “proletarian novel,” updated

Part 4: This year’s German films: In general, a more serious tone

Part 5: Romania, Bosnia, and the problems of immigrants

Part 6: The jurist Fritz Bauer and Germany’s Nazi past

Toronto International Film Festival 2009

Part 1: Polarization and protest

By David Walsh, September 30, 2009

To make useful sense of an event as large and contradictory as the Toronto film festival, which screened 273 feature films from 64 countries this year, is no easy matter.

Part 2: “The Iraq war poisoned the water—you can’t undo that, it’s there forever”

Part 3: Filmmakers on violence and social tension in the Middle East

Part 4: More human (and artistic) problems

Part 5: Compassion, vision, genius

Part 6: Thoroughly lost, or playing at it

Filmmakers, writers protest Toronto festival spotlight on Tel Aviv

By David Walsh, September 10, 2009

Dozens of filmmakers, writers and others have signed an Open Letter to the Toronto International Film Festival, criticizing the festival’s decision “to host a celebratory spotlight on Tel Aviv.”

Protest against Toronto film festival collusion with Israeli regime continues

By David Walsh, September 16, 2009

Organizers of a protest against the Toronto film festival’s spotlight on Tel Aviv held a press conference Monday afternoon to explain their purposes and respond to attacks by pro-Israeli forces.

An interview with Asli Özge, director of Men on the Bridge

By David Walsh, October 10, 2009

Asli Özge is the director of Men on the Bridge, a Turkish film screened at the recent Toronto film festival. We spoke during the festival.

Sydney Film Festival 2009

Part 1: Courage and audacity sadly lacking

By Richard Phillips, July 9, 2009

The quality of new work screened at this year’s Sydney Film Festival was patchy and generally undemanding, with critical human issues largely unexplored.

Part 2: Competition movies: largely passive reflections

By Ismet Redzovic, July 10, 2009

Part 3: Some perceptive documentaries

By Richard Phillips and Ismet Redzovic, July 13, 2009

Part 4: Vital ingredients missing

By George Morley, July 14, 2009

Part 5: Several movies well worth revisiting

By Richard Phillips, July 17, 2009

San Francisco International Film Festival 2009

Part 1: Painful truths

By David Walsh, 20 May 2009

The recent San Francisco film festival, its 52nd, presented 151 films from 55 countries to a combined audience of some 82,000 people.

Severe artistic unevenness, a sharp contrast between advanced technical means and the inadequacy of thought and expression, a lagging behind the realities of contemporary life—these are some of the qualities of international filmmaking in recent years. And that continues in the first year following the greatest economic crash since 1929.

Part 2: Human drama, partially treated

By David Walsh, 22 May 2009

Part 3: The trauma produced by events

By Joanne Laurier, 25 May 2009

 

See also: An interview with He Jianjun, director of River People, June 25, 2009

The 59th Berlinale

Part 1

Lagging alarmingly behind the times

By Stefan Steinberg, February 19, 2009

Perhaps most striking about the latest Berlinale was the absence of any comprehension of the urgency of the current crisis. None of the burning issues at the end of the first decade of the twenty-first century were adequately addressed at the festival.

See also The 59th Berlinale—Part 2: A few healthy shoots and Intimations of changes to come—but nothing more: On the film series After Winter Comes Spring—Films presaging the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Vancouver International Film Festival 2008

World Socialist Web Site arts critics David Walsh and Joanne Laurier wrote extensively on new films shown during the 2008 Vancouver International Film Festival, which ran from September 25 to October 10.

Part 1, "Life in its incontrovertible reality," was published October 13; Part 2, "Art, artists, the difficulties of the 20th century," was published October 16; Part 3, "The oppressed and excluded," followed on October 20; Part 4, "Repentance, betrayal and the less dramatic," was published October 23; and Part 5, "Six films: problems of perspective, passivity," concluded the series on October 27.

See also Walsh's interviews with Li Yifan, director of The Longwang Chronicles, published October 20, Azharr Rudin, director of This Longing, published October 27, and Ying Liang, director of Good Cats, published November 15.

The Toronto International Film Festival

A series of film reviews and director interviews published September 18-29 2008, devoted to the 2008 Toronto International Film Festival (September 4-13).

See Part 1, 2, 3 , 4, and 5, as well as the WSWS interview with Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, directors of Lorna’s Silence.