I Stumble onto the 2025 Berlinale
Who can resist the attraction of mostly-female fans, screaming into spotlights?
BERLIN (14. Feb, 2025) — I don’t like doing quickie “spot news” like this. (I’m afraid of it getting in the way of my other work — the longer-term “thinky” stuff.) That said, I guess this kind of thing always has “paid the bills,” so to speak….
Yesterday was a teriffic day — in that I’d gotten a lot of things done. At the end of it, around 5 p.m., I was reading and copying material at the Berlin State Library (Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin). This is a beautiful, almost magical place to work — made somewhat famous by film director Wim Wenders, with his 1987 film, “Wings of Desire.”
There, last evening, I checked out two books — one about a Romanian-American writer and philosopher; the other about big-time political fights in the Balkans, just as Hitler and Stalin were rising to power. Because this second book was printed in 1935 — so fragile and rare — I wasn’t allowed to take it home. Thus, it became easy to decide to copy the entire thing.
I walked into beautiful snowy Berlin, footsteps accented by the scrunchy sound of my shoes against the path to Potsdamer Platz — and a quick train home.
I got comfortable at a desk and arranged the desk lamp so that I could quietly turn 244 pages, shooting each one with the “spy camera” hidden in my telephone. (This is what Google was doing, back in 2002, with the work of millions of writers, living and dead, briefly offering their texts for free, before getting “push-back” from organizations of U.S. publishers & writers, including me….)
I left the library well past dark, going out into a rare, beautifully snowy Berlin. (Here, winter snow is almost as good — and as rare — as winter sunshine.) Moving toward Potsdamer Platz, past the big Keith Haring sculpture, my footsteps were accented by snow-scrunchy sounds against the well-lit path. I was approaching the station where I could count on finding a quick train home — and then I heard the fans.
Who can resist the attraction of mostly-female youth, screaming into a battery of spotlights? So I went over to take a look, and found myself joining them — all of us crowded behind several layers of rope-line outside what is temporarily named the “Berlinale Palast” theater. *
I’d stumbled, of course, into the Klieg-lit opening night of the 75th annual Berlinale (the Berlin Film Festival), where cameras and crowds awaited the red-carpet arrival of this year’s most high-profile “players” — film-artists, festival jury members, etc.
These prominent people — the “Promies” in German — were just now making their way out of the nearby gala banquet, where actor Tilda Swinton was (deservedly) the main attraction. Organizers of the festival honored her with a special “Golden Bear” award, acknowledging both her work in film and her years of involvement with the Berlinale, helping to make it the major annual event that it has become.
For my part, I smiled in Ms. Swinton’s direction and further celebrated the rest of the beautiful day and evening by getting onto a train homeward. On the way home, I messaged a couple of friends with the photo & a note, which I’m now sharing with you now:
”Tilda says ‘Hi!’ ” ;-)
* The theater was premiering “The Light” (Das Licht) a new film by screenwriter and director Tom Twyker.