Sawt Falasteen - Less glamour, more content, says Wim Wenders of Berlin Film Fest

At a news conference to mark the beginning of the festival on Thursday morning, Wenders hailed the power of cinema to "change the world" while cautioning that "no movie has really changed any politician's idea".

"We can change the idea that people have of how they should live," said 80-year-old Wenders, who himself won an honorary Golden Bear award at the festival in 2015 in recognition of an illustrious career stretching back to the 1970s.

The Berlinale is the first major international festival on the annual film calendar, and has a reputation for topical and progressive programming.

This year's edition takes place against the backdrop of international tensions, the bloody crackdown on protests in Iran and global threats to human rights.

Later on the red carpet Wenders told AFP that this year's films reflected a trend towards "less glamour, but more content".

"I love glamour but I love it even more if movies are about who we are and what we are doing," he said.

Asked about his relationship with American filmmakers working in the tense current climate under President Donald Trump, Wenders said: "I have a lot of allies in America and they make some movies that are extremely necessary right now.

"You followed the Superbowl, so America is waking up in many ways," said Wenders, alluding to Puerto Rican superstar Bad Bunny's groundbreaking Spanish-language set.

- 'Opportunity' for Afghan cinema -

The festival's opening film, "No Good Men", by Iran-born Afghan director Shahrbanoo Sadat, tells the story of Naru, a reporter at a Kabul TV station going through an acrimonious separation from her husband and who is increasingly questioning her beliefs about men.

The film is set in the run-up to the Taliban authorities' seizure of power in 2021, which led Sadat herself to leave the country. She now lives in Hamburg.

Sadat, who also plays the lead role of Naru, told AFP she was delighted and "surprised" to be chosen to open the festival.

"It took time until I could put myself together and realise what a big honour it is for me," Sadat told AFP.

Afghan filmmakers are "trying to figure out... what does it mean to be the storyteller of our own stories", Sadat said.

"So I think for the young Afghan cinema it's really a great opportunity," she said.

Malaysian actress Michelle Yeoh, who won the Best Actress Oscar in 2023 for "Everything Everywhere All at Once", received an Honorary Golden Bear at this year's festival.

Speaking at the opening ceremony Yeoh said: "In a world that so easily divides us, gathering in the dark to share a story feels quietly radical."

More than 200 films will be shown over the 10 days of the festival, of which 22 will be in competition for the top prize, the Golden Bear.

As was the case last year, around 40 percent of films being shown at the festival are from women directors, including nine of the 22 films in official competition.

- 'Biting satire' -

In comparison with Cannes or Venice, Berlin attracts fewer big productions with A-list-heavy casts.

But Russell Crowe and Ethan Hawke star in "The Weight", a tale of a man forced to smuggle gold through the lethal wilderness of Depression-era rural Oregon.

Southern Germany stands in for the US Northwest in the film, one of an increasing number of US productions choosing to shoot abroad to save on costs.

In official competition, one of the most eagerly awaited films is "Rosebush Pruning", from Berlinale favourite Karim Ainouz, billed as "a biting satire about the absurdity of the traditional patriarchal family".

The cast boasts Elle Fanning, Callum Turner, Jamie Bell and Pamela Anderson, who are sure to be some of Saturday's red-carpet highlights.

German actress Sandra Hueller, who attracted international acclaim for her roles in "Anatomy of a Fall" and "The Zone of Interest", stars in Markus Schleinzer's "Rose". She plays a woman passing herself off as a male soldier returning to a German village in the early 17th century.

Also in competition, Amy Adams stars as a woman leaving rehab and confronting buried trauma in Kornel Mundruczo's "At the Sea".

And in Beth de Araujo's "Josephine", Channing Tatum plays the father of a child traumatised by witnessing a violent crime.

W.AbuLaban--SF-PST