Charles_Soebarta@Berlin DocuFest

White House says it will not return the Statue of Liberty to France A French politician said the U.S. no longer deserved the legendary monument.

“We’re going to say to the Americans who have chosen to side with the tyrants, to the Americans who fired researchers for demanding scientific freedom: ‘Give us back the Statue of Liberty,’” Raphaël Glucksmann, French member of the European Parliament.
www.politico.com/news/2025/03...

'Conventions were exploded to make something with the remains': Jean-Luc Godard on the film that changed cinema Stylish and experimental, Breathless heralded a new era of film-making when it was released 65 years ago. In 1964, its director told the BBC why he broke every rule he could.

Breathless (À bout de souffle), was released 65 years ago this month.
www.bbc.com/culture/arti...

Miami Beach mayor wants to end lease of theater that screened Israeli-Palestinian documentary The mayor of Miami Beach, Florida, wants to terminate a lease and cut financial support for an independent film theater that screened “No Other Land,” describing the Oscar-winning documentary about th...

The mayor of Miami Beach in Florida has threatened to terminate the lease of a local arthouse cinema in retaliation for screening documentary Oscar winner No Other Land.
apnews.com/article/isra...

The Brutalist Scale Model A 1:500 scale replica of The Margaret Lee Van Buren Center for Creation and Activity, as seen in Brady Corbet’s 10x Academy Award-nominated The Brutalist. The model can be deconstructed into three par...

Out of stock, but more coming.
shop.a24films.com/products/the...

The treasure trove of art worth billions 'hidden' in Tehran Masterpieces by the likes of Pablo Picasso and Vincent Van Gogh feature in the collection in Iran's capital.

According to estimates in 2018, the collection is worth as much as $3bn.
www.bbc.com/news/article...

Photographs Seized Amid Intimidation Against Forth Worth Museum — ARC Artists at Risk Connection (ARC) strongly condemned the reported seizure by Texas authorities on Monday of Sally Mann’s photographs from the Diaries of Home exhibition at the Modern Art Museum of Fort...

Sally Mann Photos Seized from Texas Museum Following Official Complaint.
artistsatriskconnection.org/story/photog...

Eleven key projects by Pritzker Architecture Prize-winner Liu Jiakun Following the news that Liu Jiakun has won this year's Pritzker Architecture Prize, we round up 11 notable projects from the Chinese architect's four-decade-long career.

Liu Jiakun, the founder of Jiakun Architects, was announced as the 54th laureate of the prestigious architecture award today in recognition of his buildings that "celebrate the everyday lives of people".
www.dezeen.com/2025/03/04/l...

One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest: 50 years on Jack Nicholson’s greatest performance is as fresh as ever McMurphy becomes an unlikely leader to the asylum patients, helping them to discover self-belief and confidence.

Fifty years on, Miloš Forman’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest has lost none of its power.
theconversation.com/one-flew-ove...

Israeli-Palestinian film No Other Land wins Oscar for best documentary The collaboration between Israeli and Palestinian filmmakers triumphed over four other documentaries.

“We call on the world to take serious actions to stop the injustice and to stop the ethnic cleansing of Palestinian people”. Basel Adra, director No Other Land.
www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/3/...

Brutalism – the architectural style that dared to summon a new world from the ashes of World War II Its staggering forms made monuments out of ordinary places frequented by ordinary people.

Monuments to the masses.
theconversation.com/brutalism-th...

‘A chilling effect’: is Hollywood too scared to touch hot-button documentaries? This Sunday could see West Bank-set documentary No Other Land win an Oscar but it remains without US distribution, one of many challenging films facing problems

After first winning the Berlinale Documentary Award and the Audience Award at Berlin now over a year ago, “No Other Land” has sat without distribution from U.S. buyers.
www.theguardian.com/film/2025/ma...

YouTube video by Letters Live Olivia Colman reads a letter responding to an unsolicited penis photograph

At Letters Live at Women of the World Festival, Southbank Centre in March 2020, Olivia Colman read this hilarious letter.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCSY...

20 Times the Oscars Got It Wrong Yes, we're still talking about 'Crash' winning the best picture over 'Brokeback Mountain,' but we also can't get over snubs for 'Selena,' 'The Lego Movie,' 'Hoop Dreams,' 'L.A. Confidential' and more....

Why you shouldn't take the Oscars seriously. Apocalypsy Now loosing over Kramer vs. Kramer???
www.hollywoodreporter.com/lists/times-...

YouTube video by Film Fest Report Sundance 2025 | KHARTOUM (World Cinema Documentary) | First Clip 1

Khartoum is an important document , but I ask myself: how far can you go as a documentary film maker? Is it right to ask two small children to re-enact civil war atrocities they witnessed, to ask them about the mutilated bodies they saw? Was there supervision on set?
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8x0...

The Best Film at Sundance Is Just Two People Talking Ira Sachs’s new film, Peter Hujar’s Day, starts off as an elevation of the quotidian but transforms into something more reflective.

Ira Sachs’ Peter Hujar’s Day, invites us into a single day in 1974 with groundbreaking queer photographer Peter Hujar. Set entirely in one room, the film re-creates the conversation between Hujar and Rosenkrantz, recorded on audio tape nearly fifty years ago.
www.vulture.com/article/the-...

YouTube video by Turner Contemporary Resistance: How Protest Shaped Britain & Photography Shaped Protest | On Now At Turner Contemporary

Resistance, curated by Steve McQueen.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=wk6k...

Berlin film festival 2025 roundup – a new boss, a flawless fairytale and Ethan Hawke’s finest hour At a snowy Berlinale, against a backdrop of political divisions, this year’s standouts include Lucile Hadžihalilović’s The Ice Tower, Richard Linklater’s Broadway biopic of Lorenz Hart, and intensely ...

Berlinale 2025 round up, 2 more exhausting days to go, but loving every single minute.
www.theguardian.com/film/2025/fe...

Watching ‘Shoah’ in Berlin, 80 Years After Auschwitz A commemorative screening of the monumental documentary came as some artists are questioning whether Germany’s Holocaust remembrance culture stifles free speech.

Germany’s culture of Holocaust remembrance is stifling the free speech of other artists.
www.nytimes.com/2025/02/17/m...

Ai Weiwei and Eyal Weizman attend CPH:DOX to highlight rights issues - CPH:DOX When CPH:DOX takes place from March 19-30, it will feature visits from two internationally acclaimed figures who, from their respective artistic perspectives, will help shine a light on this year’s ma...

CPH:DOX’s Artistic Director, Niklas Engstrøm:
“Under the theme Right Here, Right Now, this year’s festival places a strong focus on rights in their broadest sense: human rights, civil rights, international law, and even animal rights.”
cphdox.dk/ai-weiwei-an...

Sign the Petition Iran, Clear Maryam & Behtash of All Charges Now!

The directors of Berlinale winner, My Favourite Cake will be in an Iranian court, 1 March, the charges: “production, distribution and duplication of a film with obscene content"
www.change.org/p/iran-clear...

YouTube video by Berlinale - Berlin International Film Festival "Scars of a Putsch" | Trailer | Berlinale 2025

'Scars of a Putsch'. The military coup of September 12, 1980 abruptly ended the dream of a democracy in Turkey. Abidin, the director’s husband, a Turkish revolutionary in the 1970s was hit by 7 bullets and taken by a fascist militia.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUVK...

Berlinale: 'Das Deutsche Volk' gives voice to Hanau victims – DW – 02/19/2025 Five years after one of the deadliest racially motivated attacks in Germany, a new documentary film follows the victims' families and their search for answers.

On 19 February 2020, neo-nazi Tobias, murdered 9 fellow Germans in the city of Hanau. Their names: Gökhan, Sedat, Said, Mercedes, Hamza, Vili, Fatih, Ferhat and Kaloyan. This is a testimonial about a failing justice system, and a police force with extreme right sympathies.
www.dw.com/en/berlinale...

JFK Wanted You to Watch This Movie Before He Was Assassinated The president had a hand in the making of a Cold War blockbuster.

JFK helped make a movie about the military trying to overthrow a liberal president. But before it premiered, he was assassinated.

Joy Gharoro-Akpojotor On Making Her Directorial Debut With Berlinale Asylum Drama ‘Dreamers’ — First Look Clip Emily Morgan ('I Am Not a Witch') produced the film.

In ‘Dreamers’, Isio, a Nigerian migrant detained at an asylum removal centre, is strugling for a way out, a film full of love and hope, that questions forced deportations, and made me realise how very precious freedom is.
deadline.com/2025/02/joy-...

Bedrock | A film by Kinga Michalska — Filmoption International Bedrock is a psychological journey across today’s Poland that weaves together stories of Poles living on Holocaust sites. Through a series of intimate encounters, this poetic film looks at the unsettl...

A soccer club located next to Auschwitsch-Birkenau, their club anthem ‘this is your last stop!’, Polish rappers singing about Zyklon B, a psychiatric hospital once part of an extermination camp, ‘Bedrock’. A documentary that hit me in the stomach.
www.filmoptioninternational.com/bedrock

‘Blue Moon’ Review: Ethan Hawke Shines as a Famous but Desperate Songwriter in Richard Linklater’s Vibrant Chamber Piece Linklater returns to "Me and Orson Welles" mode for a small but razor-sharp biopic about Richard Rodgers' pre-"Oklahoma!" collaborator Lorenz Hart.

Ethan Hawke gave me a great 100 minutes of glorious cinema in Richard Linklater's 'Blue Moon'! Loved it!!!
www.indiewire.com/criticism/mo...

Mikita-Cobalt a documentary that follows artisanal miners in their struggle to survive, and their fight against multinational corporations and industrial giants. This is where the stuff in your mobile phones, tablets, laptops and other gadgets comes from.
www.berlinale.de/en/2025/prog...

“The Film is Not a Resistance Film”: Juanjo Pereira on Berlinale 2025 Premiere <em>Under the Flags, the Sun</em> | Filmmaker Magazine Publication with a focus on independent film, offering articles, links, and resources.

Juanjo Pereira's powerful documentary 'Under the Flags, the Sun,' takes us inside Alfredo Stroessner’s 35-year authoritarian regime in Paraguay. Through found footage, the movie exposes the mechanisms of a brutal, military dictatorship.
filmmakermagazine.com/129638-berli...

Koki, Ciao - IFFR EN An unbelievable portrait of a cockatoo who flew in the twentieth century’s highest political spheres.

Koki, Ciao is a wonderful, short movie about Koki, Marshal Tito's parrot. Koki not only heard all of former Yugoslavia's state secrets, but was also introduced to Hollywood stars, and some dubious heads of state.
iffr.com/en/iffr/2025...

YouTube video by Berlinale - Berlin International Film Festival Honorary Golden Bear for Tilda Swinton | Acceptance Speech | Berlinale 2025

Tilda Swinton's speech, I cannot get enough, sheer poetry.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fqol...