At the end of the 19th edition of AROUND THE WORLD IN 14 FILMS, the jury - the actress, author and filmmaker Maryam Zaree, the film director and screenwriter Annika Pinske and the actor, author and director Fabian Stumm - presented the BASIS BERLIN Postproduction Award for Best Director to Mo Harawe for his feature film "The Village Next to Paradise" on December 7, 2024 in the cinema in the Kulturbrauerei. The debut film of the Somali-Austrian screenwriter and director was supported by ARTE and the World Cinema Fund (WCF) of the Berlinale, among others. The jury viewed the entries in the "14 Films" section of the cinematic world tour. The prize, a voucher worth 5,000 euros, was donated for the fourth time this year by the post-production house BASIS BERLIN.
The jury on their decision: "This film is a quiet, understated and, precisely for that reason, great story about an unexpected patchwork family. It is a confident and bold debut that subtly succeeds in letting the daily struggles of its characters collide with the geopolitical interests of a world that often has nothing more than ignorance for people like them. The director effortlessly understands how to place the characters and their actions at the center of the story and to use them to capture the full ambivalence of their lives. Every opportunity for self-determination that opens up to them, no matter how small, is seized - with so much resilience and tireless strength that it hurts to watch. This modest ambition of his characters is also reflected in the director's narrative style: he takes his time and patiently observes his characters in precise image compositions. Changes seem minimal - and yet the existential threat grows, the narrative becomes more urgent and political. The country's socioeconomic situation increasingly creeps into the characters' everyday lives, in which death from drone attacks or toxic waste is portrayed with frightening matter-of-factness. The film in its colors, its sparse dialogues, the complex ensemble of characters in unexpected relationships, the entire mise-en-scène - everything resonates so strongly because we have time to recognize, because we are allowed to pause and see the value of the apparently unspectacular. The fact that, despite all adversities, a spark of optimism always shines through, without any attempt to sugarcoat anything, and that something completely unexpected opens up behind every little narrative twist - that is the great power of this story. The film is the first Somali contribution to the program of the Cannes Film Festival. And this fact is as beautiful as it is tragic, because it shows how many stories and cinematic narrative styles still escape us. We are grateful to have seen this film and are delighted to present the award for Best Director to Mo Harawe for The Village Next to Paradise."
5,700 visitors in 48 performances
As in the previous year, around 5,700 visitors came to the 48 performances of the 19th festival edition in Berlin. AROUND THE WORLD IN 14 FILMS showed 28 cinematic highlights of current world cinema from November 29 to December 7, 2024 in the cinema in the KulturBrauerei as well as the delphi LUX and Neues Off cinemas in the presence of guests such as Mohammad Rasoulof, Laetitia Dosch, Dea Kulumbegashvili, Daniel Hoesl, Julia Niemann, Vesta Matulyte and Helena Zengel - and presented by the prominent sponsors Maren Eggert, Mala Emde, Nikolai Kinski, Sina Martens, Marie-Lou Sellem, Lilith Stangenberg, Lia von Blarer, Karim Aïnouz, Thomas Arslan, Nora Fingscheidt, Jan Ole Gerster, Sonja Heiss, Frédéric Jaeger, Andreas Kleinert, Dani Levy, Sophie Linnenbaum, Nicolas Wackerbarth, Knut Elstermann, Hannah Pilarczyk, Patrick Wellinski and Vincenzo Bugno. For the sixth time, the festival presented the "Berlinale Spotlight: World Cinema Fund" together with the Berlinale - with outstanding films that were created with the help of the Berlinale initiative. The main partners in 2024 were Audi City Berlin, the Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg, ARTE and CineStar.
After the Berlin edition, AROUND THE WORLD IN 14 FILMS will be shown with a large part of the program in Munich (December 10th - December 14th, 2024, City Kinos) and for the first time in Cologne (December 11th - December 18th, 2024, Odeon Kino) and Nuremberg (December 28th, 2024 - January 6th, 2025, Filmhaus Nürnberg).
Photo: Award ceremony of the BASIS BERLIN Postproduction Award on December 7, 2024 to “The Village Next to Paradise”
Picture (from left to right): Susanne Bieger, Frieda Oberlin (BASIS BERLIN), Annika Pinske (jury), Maryam Zaree (jury), Fabian Stumm (jury), Bernhard Karl
© AtWi14F, Marina Zincovitch Botelho
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