Berlinale. The Bears.

By David Hudson on 02/14/2009

The International Jury of this year's Berlinale, presided over by Tilda Swinton, has awarded the festival's top prize, the Golden Bear, to Claudia Llosa's "La teta asustada" ("The Milk of Sorrow"). Well-chosen; and it's evidently a unanimous decision, too.

The Jury Grand Prix (Silver Bear) goes to two films: Adrián Biniez's "Gigante" and Maren Ade's "Alle Anderen" ("Everybody Else").

More Silver Bears: Asghar Farhadi (best director, "About Elly"), the outstanding Birgit Minichmayr (best actress, "Alle Anderen"), Sotigui Kouyaté (best actor, "London River"; he stopped the show, by the way, with a marathon acceptance speech that actually went over quite well), Oren Moverman and Alessandro Camon (best screenplay, "The Messenger") and Gábor Erdély and Tamás Székely (for "outstanding artistic contribution" for their sound design for "Katalin Varga").

And here's another tie: Adrián Biniez's "Gigante" again and Andrzej Wajda's "Tatarak" ("Sweet Rush") have won the Alfred Bauer Prize, presented in memory of the festival's founder to a feature film that "broadens the horizons of the art of filmmaking."

"Gigante's" two awards from the International Jury follow the announcement that it's also won the Best First Feature Award.

Golden Bear-winner "The Milk of Sorrow" will be screening in this year's "New Directors / New Films" series, running in New York from March 25 to April 5. And again, Peter Knegt has the full lineup at indieWIRE.

More awards: "The 'Dialogue en perspective' was initiated in 2004 by the international francophone television channel TV5MONDE and the Berlinale, and is awarded in cooperation with the GFYO to a film from the section Perspektive Deutsches Kino." This year's winner: Anna Deutsch's "Gitti."

Generation Kplus is the section for children and young adults; heading the list of Crystal Bear-winners is Philippe Falardeau's feature film, "C'est pas moi, je le jure!"

Topping the list of the Panorama Audience Awards: "The Yes Men Fix The World."

There'll be one more stand-alone Berlinale roundup entry tomorrow (further related news will fall into those "Fests and events" entries); and, starting soon, I'll be catching up with reviews, too.

Tags: Berlinale 2009