BERLIN SIDEWALK » Berlinale

Welcome to 2012

Carsten — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 03:59:42 +0000

Welcome to 2012, I spent the holidays with my family outside Berlin and I really enjoyed the time off. I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and of course a good start into the new year.

The Year 2012 will be legen… wait for it… dary, with more events, more festivals and more of everything. The new Berlin International Airport (BER) will open its doors on June 3rd 2012 to connect Berlin even more with the rest of the World and you will now have the chance to fly directly from your homeland to Berlin without a time-consuming stop in Frankfurt.

But this isn’t all, The International Green Week, the 62nd Berlinale, the Berlin Air Show and of course the Festival of Lights will be back in 2012.

Follow me on Facebook and Twitter and don’t forget to visit the Event Calendar to stay up-to-date with upcoming Events in 2012.

Festival of Lights 2010

Berlinale 2011 – The Exhibition

Carsten — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 16:11:14 +0000

The Berlinale 2011 is over. During the last week 18 young photographers received the opportunity to experience working as professional photojournalists to show us this years Berlinale through their eyes, or should I say, through their cameras?

All the works were gathered at the C/O Berlin gallery and Dieter Kosslick himself opened the exhibition “Close Up!”.

Berlinale 2011 – Hollywood in Berlin

Carsten — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 00:00:42 +0000

The City of Berlin has placed a 14 meters high and 53 meters wide Hollywood Sign in the middle of the Tiergarten between the Brandenburg Gate and the Potsdamer Platz.

The Holly- wait.. there is only one L? Oh boy, something went terribly wrong…

Just kidding, the Holywood Sign is a creation by the artist and filmmaker Ralf Schmerberg and part of a Climate Protection campaign, to plant 10.000 new trees all across the City.

So from now on, it’s “Welcome to HolyWood”.

Berlinale 2011 – Helena Bonham Carter

Carsten — Wed, 16 Feb 2011 16:14:46 +0000

Finally I had some time to visit this years Berlinale at Potsdamer Platz and lucky me got some shots of Helena Bonham Carter as she left the Hyatt Hotel near the Berlinale Palace to promote the new movie “The King’s Speech”.

Helena is well known for her role as Bellatrix Lestrange in Joan K Rowlings Harry Potter or on the Side of Johnny Depp as Mrs. Lovett in Sweeney Todd.

Welcome to the Space Show World Premiere

Carsten — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 20:05:17 +0000

I watched the second Anime during this years Berlinale, the world premiere of Welcome to the Space Show or Uchuu Show e Youkoso / 宇宙ショーへようこ if you are more familiar with the Japanese title.

A tiny mountain village in a remote woodland region. Five primary school kids have come together in this idyllic spot in order to spend their summer holidays at a camp. At first the children enjoy carefree days amidst unspoiled nature far away from adult supervision. But their life changes dramatically when they come across what they believe to be a small dog, badly in need of help.

The creature turns out not to be a dog at all but an alien on an important mission. It seems there is a mysterious substance on earth that is coveted throughout the universe.

The movie was produced by the same guys who brought you R.O.D -Read or Die-, Ishihama Masashi Masunari Kouji, Hideyuki Kurata and Tomonori Ochikoshi, all of them were parts of the audience.

There was only one thing I found a bit disturbing, I watched the movie in three languages, Japanese language, English subtitle and… a German translator for every single sentence and also totally emotionless.

But overall It was a really great movie with an interesting science-fiction story and cute characters.

Berlinale 2010 presents Summer Wars サマーウォーズ

Carsten — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 02:10:27 +0000

So I watched Summer Wars today at an official cinema of the Berlinale 2010. It’s the DVD premiere in Germany and the movie was shown two weeks earlier, of course in Japanese language with English subs.

The movie was about a boy called Kenji, a computer technician for a virtual world called Oz (a massive social network in which everything is connected with the real world) who was invited by the most popular girl at his high school to her expansive family’s home for a summer job.

During their trip, the world of Oz became infected by a virus, Kenji’s Account got hacked and so the chaos begun.

Hosoda Mamoru, the producer himself, was one of today’s guests and at the end, he answered a couple of questions about the movie which I can’t tell you without spoiling you the story. The only thing I can tell you is that he got his inspiration from his own family… oh yes and that he loves Germany.

Berlinale 2010 Ticket Madness

Carsten — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 11:28:58 +0000

Seems like this years Berlinale is pretty popular, people standing in line for about one hour to get a ticket for their favorite movie or a chance to meet one of the many stars who came to Berlin to present their newest creations.

Berlinale 2010 – International Film Festival in Berlin

Carsten — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 14:31:53 +0000

The Berlinale in Berlin has begun, artists from around the world came to Berlin, to present their newest creations. Up to 400 films are shown every year, more than 19,000 film professionals from 136 countries, including about 4,000 journalists, are accredited for the Berlin International Film Festival every year. The Berlin International Film Festival sees itself as a showcase for what is happening in cinema, but also as an actor and propagator on the international film circuit.