We’re barely unpacked from the Sundance Film Festival, and already, the Berlin Film Festival is upon us. Kicking off next week, it’s the first big Euro festival on the calendar, and as such, it’s bringing the big guns. With Wes Anderson‘s “The Grand Budapest Hotel,” George Clooney‘s “The Monuments Men” and Lars von Trier‘s director’s cut of “Nymphomaniac Part One” among the bigger ticket items (with a line-up that also includes: “Boyhood,” “Snowpiercer,” “Two Faces Of January,” “American Hustle” and more), organizers have put some impressive finishing touches on the schedule.
They’ve announced today that Martin Scorsese‘s upcoming, still-untitled documentary on the New York Review Of Books will be the closing film of the Berlin Film Festival, screening as a work-in-progress. First revealed about a year ago, not much has been heard on the project which was apparently being readied for the publication’s 50th anniversary. And the only new info we have right now is that Scorsese co-directed the effort with David Tedeschi, an editor who has worked with the filmmaker on previous docs such as “Public Speaking,” “George Harrison: Living in the Material World,” “Shine A Light” and more. Either way, it’s more Scorsese, so count us excited.
Meanwhile, Netflix‘s “House Of Cards” just got a boost of street cred, with the first two episodes of the highly anticipated second season getting a Berlinale Special Gala screening. And following last year’s festival screening of the entire run of Jane Campion‘s “Top Of The Lake,” it perhaps suggests that programmers are no longer distinguishing between movies and TV—they just want good storytelling from top tier talent, no matter what shape it’s in.
The Berlin Film Festival runs from February 6 -16. [THR]