Best of Berlinale 2019: Tilda Swinton acts with daughter, Casey Affleck’s new film, François Ozon takes on Catholic Church

Despite the pulling of Chinese filmmaker Zhang Yimou’s latest, One Second, there was a win for China, and much else to admire, at Berlin film festival

Films in competition for the Golden Bear, won by Nadav Lapid, tackled big issues – sex abuse, homelessness, famine, a serial killer – some based on real life

4-MIN READ4-MIN

Tom Mercier and Louise Chevillotte in a still from Synonyms, directed by Nadav Lapid, which won the Golden Bear at the 2019 Berlinale – the Berlin International Film Festival.

Published: 12:30am, 19 Feb 2019Updated: 8:21pm, 20 Feb 2019

After 18 years in charge of the Berlinale, this 69th edition of one of the world’s most venerated film festivals marked the final selection by artistic director Dieter Kosslick.

The festival has faced challenges over the years – it’s not the premiere destination for filmmakers in the way Cannes is, nor is it the launch pad for films on the awards trail, unlike the Venice and Toronto film festivals. Rather, Kosslick has ensured the Berlin event seeks out unheralded talent, something incoming co-directors Mariette Rissenbeek and Carlo Chatrian must continue.

Admittedly, the 2019 festival had an underwhelming start, with the opening film Lone Scherfig’s critically mauled The Kindness of Strangers. A New York City-set drama, it certainly felt more ragged than her earlier Berlin hits Italian for Beginners and An Education.

Zoe Kazan plays a mother-of-two who escapes domestic abuse from her police officer husband in the New York State city of Buffalo, with Andrea Riseborough, Bill Nighy and Tahar Rahim also starring. True, it’s a naive, soft-centred film about homelessness, but Scherfig deserves some credit for delivering a story not drenched in cynicism.

Zoe Kazan and Tahar Rahim in a still from The Kindness of Strangers, directed by Lone Scherfig.

It didn’t help Kosslick’s swansong selection that Chinese director Zhang Yimou’s One Second, a return to his art-house roots after commercial films like Shadow and The Great Wall , was pulled from its slot “due to technical difficulties during post-production”, a statement that fuelled speculation the Cultural Revolution-set drama had fallen foul of Chinese censors.