Berlin Today Award 2011

updated: January 20, 2012

Photo gallery of the Berlin Today Award 2011

“Leaving the Familiar Sector”: Since its invention, cinema has helped us to imagine what our lives could be like and how the world could look. Film offers an extraordinary glimpse into a world you've never seen, never dreamt of, or never dared to enter. Crossing between sectors in a wall-dominated Berlin used to be an experience where everything could change in the space of a few hundred metres. How do you imagine a world beyond what you've known, and what do you see when you leave the place you know best?

The motto of the Berlin Today Award 2011 encourages filmmakers to envision a world beyond the familiar.

Procedure

150 Talents from 55 countries applied for the Berlin Today Award 2011 “Leaving the Familiar Sector”. After 15 up-and-coming directors and 10 production companies met during a "Producers’ Meeting" during the Berlinale Talent Campus in February 2010, five projects were selected by a Jury to be produced as finalists for the Berlin Today Award 2011. The directing talents together with five Berlin-Brandenburg production companies created a filmic vision of a world outside of the familiar. They obtained funding from the Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg (film subsidy board) and support from the German film industry to produce their films.

The films were shot in Ireland, England, Romania and Berlin, during summer/autumn of 2010. Postproduction took place in Berlin and Brandenburg.

The world premiere of the finalist short films was held during the Opening of the Berlinale Talent Campus 2011. The winner was chosen by a jury consisting of actress and Campus alumna Dorka Gryllus, director Hannes Stöhr and producer Peter Rommel and received the Berlin Today Award 2011 during a gala ceremony.

...and the Berlin Today Award 2011 goes to...

Kyoko Miyake from UK/ Japan for her short film Hackney Lullabies.

The eighth Berlin Today Award goes to London based Kyoko Miyake (Japan) for her documentary Hackney Lullabies, created and shot in the London neighbourhood of Hackney. The short film portrays young immigrant mothers in Britain and how they transmit a sense of home to their children through lullabies. “With Hackney Lullabies, Japanese director Kyoko Miyake offers a sensitive, funny, warm-hearted and interesting contribution to the immigration debate in times of globalisation. The jury was crying and singing lullabies as they left the meeting,” according to the three jurors, actress Dorka Gryllus, director Hannes Stöhr and producer Peter Rommel.

Congratulations to Kyoko!

Finalists

The Day We Danced on the Moon

Tristan Daws, UK. Documentary
Produced by Kloos & Co. Medien GmbH

We might all have our day on the moon, but sooner or later we will all come crashing down to earth...

Synopsis

THE DAY WE DANCED ON THE MOON tells the story of THE CHANNEL ONE BAND, a reggae band of mental health patients, as they journey to the West Coast of Ireland. Along their way they share with us the experience of psychosis, a mental illness where a sufferer perceives the world in a different way. A journey out of ourselves into another state of mind that shows us that no matter how extraordinary an experience might be, reality will eventually come calling. We might all have our day on the moon, but sooner or later we will all come crashing down to earth...

Director’s Notes

I have always been drawn to stories of the unfamiliar and to tales of unknown worlds. I think, above all, it was a desire to take people outside of their own understanding that led me to become a film maker. The Day We Danced on the Moon is a fantastical story that will both transport the viewer to a new way of experiencing the world, and at the same time, challenge their preconceptions about mental illness.

It was through my own music that I first discovered “Channel One”, since there is a great history in London of samba being used within mental health. By telling small stories, my hope is to illuminate a bigger picture, whether it be a social issue or a universal truth. And thoughThe Day We Danced on the Moon transcends traditional boundaries of genre, the heart of the film remains with Peter and Coral, and their fierce passion to overcome their psychoses through art.

About the Director

Tristan Daws trained as a theatre director at London's Drama Centre and worked in the theatre in London and Vienna. He was particularly drawn to works of magical realism and directed productions of "Life is a Dream" by Calderón and "The Prince of Homburg" by Kleist, amongst others. Tristan’s passion for film drew him to the National Film and Television School, where he trained as a fiction director. His short films have subsequently screened at several international film festivals. Tristan is the director of the London School of Samba and recently shot a documentary about street kids learning to play samba in the favelas of Rio de Janeiro. He is also preparing to shoot a film about underground breakdancing in Tehran.

About the Production Comapany

DOCUMENTARY FILMS ARE OUR PASSION. Founded in 2002 by Grimme Award-winner Stefan Kloos and his partner Anja Dziersk, Kloos & Co. Medien produce high quality documentaries for TV and cinema.

They love to laugh and they believe that documentary films can and should entertain. Their films are out there to move people, to leave a mark and make their audience think and talk about what they watched. They work with young talents, experienced directors, an excellent inhouse production crew and freelance experts in order to capture most different facets of reality.

Festivals

Hot Docs Toronto, Toronto, Canada, April 26 - May 6, 2011
Visions Du Réel, Nyon, Switzerland, April 26 - 27, 2011
Sheffield Doc/Fest, UK, June 13 - 17, 2011
Huesca International Film Festival, Spain, June 3 - 11, 2011

Little Red

by Eva Pervolovici, Romania. Fiction
Written by Monica Stan and Eva Pervolovici.
Produced by BELEZA FILM

Little Red, don’t dawdle along the way. The woods are dark and dangerous.

Synopsis

My name is Ica. I am 10 years old. My shoes are red. I like red, violet and blue. Out of coloured paper I make animals and flowers and stuff. My father brings me glue to stick the coloured papers together. He works all day long. He cooks me pasta with tomatoes. He never lets me go into the forest. The forest is big and I am small. Every night I see a princess. Her dress is white and beautiful. She goes into the forest. Last night I followed her.

Director’s notes

Little Red focuses on the idea of infantile eroticism and the transition from childhood to adolescence, when the child’s sexual views are only in their early instinctual stages of development and much under the influence of the child’s beliefs in the surreal. My first motivation in doing this film is the fact that the theme of infantile eroticism has usually been approached in an objective way, from the “grown-ups” point of view, but not from the child’s perspective. What I want to create is the inner world of Ica, the way she imagines sexuality being a mixture of real elements and fantasies: fairy tales, urban myths, her doll's world and her colourful collages. The journey Ica undertakes into the magical forest is her initiation into eroticism.

About the Director

Eva is a young Romanian film director, recently having completed her MFA Advance Film Practice in Edinburgh. Her short films have been screened at festivals around the world and won several prizes. Down the Rabbit Hole, a 35 mm graduation fiction short, was screened in London, Edinburgh, Milano, Strasbourg, Singapore etc. My Undone School Film (2007), a 16 mm fiction short, won the best Experimental Film at Hyperion Film Festival in Romania and screened at Milwaukee Short Film Festival, USA. Amelia, a black and white 35mm short, won the photography prize and the Special Jury Prize the Early Bird Students’ Film Festival, Bulgaria. She currently develops with Strada film a feature film project, Ileana written during an “artists in residence” in Paris.

About the Production Company

Beleza Film produces feature films and documentary projects for the national and international market. They believe in creative teamwork and their main focus lies in the close and constant collaboration with the filmmakers.

Mummy's Little Helper

by Michael Lavelle, Ireland. Fiction.
Produced by Macchiato Pictures Filmproduktion

A mother discovers an illegal way to lose weight, with frightening consequences...especially for her daughter.

Synopsis

Mummy's Little Helper is a dark psychological thriller in the vein of Rosemary’s Baby but it is shot with a hand-held, observational feel that lends the film an edge of raw of documentary realism. Catherine is 40 years old, the mother of Ailish (a 10 year old, tubby girl) and wife to an Ambassador in Berlin. On the surface she seems to lead a charmed life but secretly she struggles with growing insecurity about her pear shaped body. While hosting a reception, she overhears a private conversation and finds out about a secret way to lose weight. At night Catherine leaves her familiar sector and goes to a rundown part of town in search of the mysterious cure…The story is witnessed through the eyes of Catherine’s daughter Ailish, who over the course of the film gradually awakens to a dark sense of insecurity about her own body.

Director’s Notes

I wanted to make this film because people close to me have been touched by anorexia and I wanted the chance to explore that dark and terrifying journey. This film is not about monsters. It is about the disturbing way that in our everyday lives a doubt can get inside us and grow out of all proportion, so that eventually it takes control. It destroys not only us but also can lead us to hurt the ones we love the most. I believe that horror is in the imagination, the unseen, the suggested. The film does not have CGI special effects. It is shot in a raw almost documentary style. It is not a gore fest, instead, it is about a slowly growing unease, an insecurity made real and tangible…that will live in the imagination of audiences long after the final disturbing frame. Most of the horror films that are made do not scare me. However, since this film is shot through with a raw sense of realism it will breathe a quiet terror into those who watch it. When this film is shown, I imagine audiences taking their seats, but only ever using the edges of them. This film is about how our insecurities can take control of us. How they can devour us from the inside out. I made this film because that terrifies me. Mummy's Little Helper will take audiences into a disturbing realm that, while fictional, is dangerously close to the bone of reality. Each frame will lure them further down the rabbit hole where dangerous insecurities can lead us. Before they know it, they will have left the familiar sector far, far behind. And there is no way back.

About the Director

Michael Lavelle trained as a cinematographer in the National Film School of Ireland at Dun Laoghaire. Michael’s work as a cinematographer includes Undressing My Mother which won numerous awards including the Prix UIP Tampere and a European Academy Award. He is also the winner of the World Cinematography Award for Documentary at Sundance Film Festival 2010 for His & Hers (Dir. Ken Wardrop). The film won Best Irish feature at Galway Film Fleadh, the Audience Award at Dublin Film Festival and garnered an IFTA for Best Documentary. Having also completed an MA in Screenwriting at the National Film School he has written and directed several shorts. The highly acclaimed Out Of The Blue, described as boasting “excellent performances, vivid production design and an economy of story-telling that mark the director as a talent to look out for in the future", won the Audience Award for Best Irish Short Film at the Cork Film Festival and picked up Best International Short at The London Independent Film Festival. Michael is currently in pre-production with Samson Films (Once) on his debut feature as writer/director. The film, titled 6 Hours, is about the kidnapping of an Irish doctor in Congo.

About the Production Company

Macchiato Pictures based in Berlin aims to produce contemporary films with extraordinary stories, striking images, with high standards and quality for an international audience. Macchiato Pictures is a young production company that was able to build from scratch a professional network by producing the short films Hakim and Wenn Bäume Puppen Tragen.

Hackney Lullabies

By Kyoko Miyake, Japan / UK. Documentary.
Produced by FILMKANTINE UG

Listen to the gentle lullabies sung by the mothers of Hackney, transforming London into a different place for each child.

Synopsis

Every night under Hackney skies, mothers from faraway lands create a familiar space for their children by singing them lullabies, the same ones they heard as children. The film enters the intimate space between mother and child, and explores the dilemma she faces in sharing her sense of home with a child who is rooted in another country and culture. Do the lullabies bring them closer together, or accentuate the difference between them?

Director’s Notes

I have always been fascinated by the role lullabies play in our psyche as they are so elusive and yet seem to touch something fundamental to our emotional being and cultural roots. I was curious about the way in which hearing and speech are connected to our identities because quite often what makes us part of a certain culture seems to be less about how we look than how we sound.

My interest deepened when I interviewed an elderly Japanese woman for my last film who had lived in Britain for more than three decades. She wanted to bring up her daughter as British but could not sing her any lullabies in English. She said that it was then that she realised that however hard she tried to adapt to the new environment, there would always be a limit. I decided to explore in my new film what lullabies mean to us, to mothers and babies.

About the director

Kyoko Miyake was born and grew up in Japan. After studying European History at the University of Tokyo, Kyoko came to the UK to continue her historical research on English witchcraft in the 17th century. The title of her M.Phil dissertation for the University of Oxford was ‘The Witch’s Unruly Tongue: Speech, Devil and Sexuality in Witchcraft Narratives’. While studying, Kyoko started working as a journalist. She worked as a researcher for the BBC and NHK, and as a writer for the Yomiuri Shimbun, the largest Japanese newspaper. She became interested in visual storytelling and started making short documentary films on her own. She is particularly interested in people crossing existing boundaries of culture and gender.

Several short documentaries directed by Kyoko have been shown at festivals internationally and won awards. One of her latest works Mrs. Birks’ Sunday Roast, which was commissioned by New Pathways Film Fund (East London/ Film London) is now part of the British Film Institute National Archive Collection. The film has been nominated for Best of Boroughs Awards and has recently won the Best Documentary Award at Supershorts International Film Festival.

About the Production Company

FILMKANTINE was established in early 2009 by Katrin Springer and Volker Ullrich to develop and produce documentaries for cinema, television and other distribution channels for the German and International markets. FILMKANTINE specialises in documentaries that tell compelling life stories and give intimate insights into the world we live in. Katrin Springer and Volker Ullrich have been working in the Film- and TV Business for more than 20 years.

Festivals

58th Sydney Film Festival, Australia, June 8-19, 2011
22th International Filmfest Emden-Norderney, Germany, June 15-22, 2011

Spoilt Broth

By Toby Roberts, UK. Fiction.
Produced by heimatmedien

A naïve, desperate man’s attempt to rob a post office sets him on a collision course with a tough, armed and ruthless criminal.

Synopsis

FELIX decides the only way to rid his life of its problems is to get rich quick by robbing a post office. The dilemma is that he’s never done it before. Felix goes beyond his comfort zone by arming himself with a pistol, walking into a quiet, rural post office and holding them up at gun point. Short, quick and easy. What he doesn’t anticipate is – when it comes to the crunch – it’s not that easy! First of all, what the hell do you say? This slight hitch pales into insignificance when Felix is confronted by a much bigger problem – a professional. As the saying goes, “Too many chefs spoil the broth”. Spoilt Broth is a short, sharp comedy with an insight into first-time armed robbery…and with an unexpected twist.

Director’s Notes

Spoilt Broth fits the notion of “leaving the familiar sector” by putting a reckless young man into a situation he has no experience of holding up a post office at gun point. But this is not a profound, sociological study of the lengths people will go to when desperation calls, it’s a smart comedy with an unexpected, clever and humorous ending. Crucially, it's not just Felix who is leaving the familiar sector, all of the characters do: Axel is interrupted for the first time ever, Bonnie comes face to face with more robbers than ever before, even the Male Cashier finds his predicament a completely new experience. Starring Oliver Korittke & Gary Whelan and shot on the new ARRI Alexa, Spoilt Broth is a compelling, tongue-in-cheek blend of the stunning visual style of Guy Ritchie with the smart and witty script-work of Quentin Tarantino.

About the Director

Toby studied film at UCLA then learned the ropes of production at Stargate Studios, Burbank, going on to write 16 scripts for television broadcast in the USA and Europe. Returning to the UK he directed documentaries for Anglia Television, commercials, pop promos, short films and live concerts. In addition Toby worked as 2nd AD in Morocco on Irwin Winkler’s Home of the Brave and as 1st AD on Kenyan soap opera Makutano Junction. Toby has produced and directed five short films, one with the UK Film Council, which between them have been selected for 69 film festivals in nine different countries bringing home seven awards.

Festivals

Corti da Sogni – Antonio Ricci Int’l SFF Ravenna, Italy, May 2011

NYC Downtown Short Film Festival, USA, May 2011

Moscow International Film Festival, Russia, Jun 2011

Janison Short Sharp Film Festival, Australia, Jul 2011

Show-Fest International, Australia, Aug 2011

DC Shorts Film Festival, USA, Sep 2011

Aesthetica Short Film Festival, UK, Nov 2011

GIAA Festival of Short Movies and Screenplays, USA, Nov 2011, WINNER, Best Comedy

Renderyard Short Film Festival, Spain

15-Minutes of Fame, Palm Bay, Florida, USA, Dec 2011 WINNER, Best Short

London Short Film Festival, UK, Jan 2011

Sputnik Kino, Berlin, Germany, Jan 2012

Short Film Channel, USA, Jan 2012

Photos of the Berlin Today Award 2011

 

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