Guided by the theme "Ready to Play? Breaking the rules", Berlinale Talents took place for the twelfth time from February 8 to 13, with 300 selected Talents and 150 experts, at the HAU Hebbel am Ufer in Berlin.
Berlinale Talents 2014 focused on the art of storytelling and finding innovative, playful approaches to content. Prominent screenwriters and directors like Michel Gondry (The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind), James Schamus (Lust and Caution), Greta Gerwig (Frances Ha), Tony Grisoni (Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas), Claudia Llosa (Aloft), Răzvan Rădulescu (Child´s Pose), Diego Luna (César Chávez), Maren Ade (Everyone Else), Christian Petzold (Barbara) and Benjamin Heisenberg (Superegos) shared their experiences with the Talents. Production designer Adam Stockhausen (TheGrand Budapest Hotel), sound designer Eugene Gearty (Hugo) and actress Nina Hoss (Barbara) spoke about their close collaborations with others and the contributions they made toward creating multifaceted stories and character intensity. Even serial formats were discussed: showrunner Neil Jordan (The Borgias) and producer Martha De Laurentiis (Hannibal) emphasised the importance of challenging oneself and bringing new ideas to the table: "What you want to is to come up with a new dialogue or a new language whether it's your writing or filmmaking or editing, you want to bring something fresh. And that's why it's important to foster youth into our industry. They are the ones with a lot of out of the box ideas,” says De Laurentiis.
Berlinale Talents once again offered a top-notch range of cinematography workshops with the support of Canon. Alongside Franz Lustig (How I Live Now), Stefan Ciupek (Blue Desert) and Christopher Doyle (In the Mood for Love), Agnès Godard (Beau travail) also gave insight into her work. In a masterclass she spoke about her close collaboration with Claire Denis and Ursula Meier, and about the power of images as well as their role in the storytelling process. “There's no such thing as images that speak on their own. They're a central part of storytelling,” says Godard.
The “Berlinale Talents Market Hub” at the European Film Market (EFM) was a complete success. The initiative, supported by Canon, developed into one of the most popular places to drop by; a meeting place for the ten invited distributors and other Talents that attracted countless market visitors. At the opening, the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media Monika Grütters visited the stand together with Festival Director Dieter Kosslick and EFM Director Beki Probst.
During the Talent Project Market, the 10.000 Euro VFF Talent Highlight Pitch Award was given to Bavo Defurne from Belgium for his project Souvenir. The nomination prizes, each worth 1.000 Euro, were awarded to Kaleena Kiff from Canada (The Long Midnight of Barney Thomson) and Ása Hjörleifsdóttir from Iceland (The Swan).
Participants in the 2014 Sound Studio had the opportunity to do sound design for a Dolby® Atmos policy trailer which will be used in Dolby® Atmos cinemas worldwide. Russian film sound designer Yulia Glukhova was selected to travel to Dolby® in Wootton Basset, England, to complete the final mixing using Dolby® Atmos.
During Berlinale Talents the Robert Bosch Stiftung issued once again the Film Prize for International Cooperation. The three film teams each received one of the three prizes for their projects in the categories "Animation" (Manivelle-Memories of the Man of Tomorrow, Lebanon / Germany), “Documentary" (Possessed by Djinn, Jordan / Germany) and “Short Fiction Film” (Dry Hot Summers, Egypt / Germany). The prizes are worth up to 60.000 Euro each.