Zac Ntim
Mon, January 23, 2023
The Berlin Film Festival on Monday said that Sean Penn will debut the documentary he shot in Ukraine with Volodymyr Zelenskyy at Berlin next month.
The doc is titled Superpower and documents Ukraine and President Zelenskyy at the start of Russia’s invasion. Penn shares a co-director credit with Aaron Kaufman.
Introducing the doc, Berlin artistic director Carlo Chatrian said: “This is a documentary film done under very difficult circumstances, but it is also a film that tells the role of art and artists in difficult times.”
Chatrian added that the film features footage of Penn in Ukraine in November 2021, filming with Zelenskyy, as well as footage of the actor-filmmaker in the country’s capital Kyiv when Russia’s invasion began.
The festival also shared an image from the doc, which features Penn and Zelenskyy in discussion.
Reports about Penn’s activities in Ukraine made headlines late last year when the two-time Oscar winner was pictured at a press briefing held by the Ukrainian government in Kyiv. In a short video posted to social media accounts, Penn was also seen gifting one of his Oscar trophies to Zelenskyy.
“It’s just a symbolic silly thing, but if I know this is here then I’ll feel better and strong enough for the fights,” Penn told Zelenskyy in the video posted by the Ukrainian president. “When you win, bring it back to Malibu, because I’ll feel much better knowing there’s a piece of me here.”
Zelenskyy in return gave Penn the Order of Merit honor “for his sincere support and significant contribution to the popularization of Ukraine in the world.”
Penn previously visited Ukraine in November 2021 to research for the film. Penn eventually left Ukraine for safety reasons.
Superpower will screen as part of the Berlinale Special Gala series. The screening will be one of the headline events at Berlin, which this year falls on the one-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion. The festival is hosting a selection of events to mark the anniversary and show support for Ukrainian filmmakers.
These events include a designated panel at Berlin’s European Film Market focused on financing options for Ukrainian audio-visual content. The EFM is also handing free market and festival accreditations to Ukrainian filmmakers. Around 50 Ukrainian industry professionals are set to travel to the festival.
The festival will also screen nine Ukrainian films across all its sections, including a new pic from Vitaly Mansky and Yevhen Titarenko titled Eastern Front, which debuts as part of the Encounters sidebar.
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News conference ahead of the 73rd Berlinale International Film Festival in Berlin
Mon, January 23, 2023
BERLIN (Reuters) - Sean Penn's documentary portrait of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, filmed as Russia invaded Ukraine a year ago, will be among headliners at next month's Berlin Film Festival, where a life achievement award will go to Steven Spielberg.
Announcing the final film line-up on Monday, artistic director Carlo Chatrian said directors Penn and Aaron Kaufmann were already in Kyiv filming "Superpower" when Russian tanks rolled across Ukraine's border, opening Europe's largest conflict since World War Two.
"The Berlinale will take place exactly one year after," Chatrian said. "And maybe Berlin is more relevant than other places, because we are close to Ukraine, because Ukrainian people live in Berlin."
With its roots in the embattled enclave of West Berlin on the front lines of the Cold War, the Berlinale sees itself as an avowedly political festival, and Chatrian said the 73rd edition would highlight the fights for freedom in Ukraine and Iran, screening dozens of films from and about both countries.
Chatrian said the 18 films running in the competition were thematically linked by their preoccupation with melodrama and love, from Emily Atef's "Someday We'll Tell Each Other Everything" about the danger and violence of teenage love, to Giacomo Abbruzzese's Disco Boy, about a Belarusian who joins the French Foreign Legion.
"We don't do the selection with melodrama in mind," Chatrian said. "We select the films because they resonate with us."
The competition will also make space for animation with "Suzume" by Japan's Makoto Shinkai, described by Chatrian as the "poet of youth". Described as a journey through the Japanese archipelago, the film stands out for its bold colouring.
The Berlinale, at home in one of the world centres of queer culture, will continue to foreground the questions of gender and identity that have in recent years preoccupied its juries, this year headed by U.S. actress Kristen Stewart.
"Orlando, My Political Biography" by Paul B. Breciado will screen outside the main competition and describes Orlando writing a letter to Virginia Wolf, writer of the eponymous novel, to tell her that the gender-shifting character she created now exists in real life.
(Reporting by Thomas Escritt; Editing by Frank Jack Daniel)
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