Photo: GettyDo you have a movie with a progressive political slant that’s been accepted at the 2013 Berlin Film Festival? If so, your day just got a little better.
Wong Kar Wai, the celebrated Chinese director who will be the jury president for the 63rd Berlinale Internationale Filmfestspiele (as it’s officially known), has announced the names of his fellow jurors for this year’s awards, and Tim Robbins, well known as an actor, director, political activist, and Susan Sarandon’s former BF, will be on hand to give the proceedings a hint of Hollywood star power and leftist gravitas. Robbins is an old hand at the Berlin Film Festival; in 1996, his second directorial project “Dead Man Walking” took home four awards at the fest.
Other members of the jury include Susanne Bier, the Danish filmmaker whose 2010 picture “In A Better World” won the Oscar for Best Foreign Film; Ellen Kuras, a director and cinematographer who has shot films for Martin Scorsese, Spike Lee, and Jonathan Demme, as well as directing the Oscar-nominated 2008 release “The Betrayal;” Shirin Neshat, an Iranian filmmaker and video artist whose work explores women’s issues in the Middle East; Athina Rachel Tsangari, a leading figure in Greek cinema who has enjoyed international success and a producer and director; and German auteur Andreas Dresen, whose 2011 film “Stopped On Track” was a major prize winner at Cannes.
A handful of noted American films will be making their German debut at the Berlin Festival, including Steven Soderbergh’s “Side Effects,”
“The Necessary Death of Charlie Countryman” featuring Shia LaBeouf and Evan Rachel Wood, and Gordon Green’s “Prince Avalanche,” headlined by Paul Rudd. And this year, a number of interesting efforts will also be screening out of competition at the festival; while Wong Kar Wai’s “The Grandmaster” will be an opening night attraction, he and his fellow judges won’t be weighing in on it, and Richard Linklater’s second sequel to “Before Sunrise,” “Before Midnight,” will also been screened out of competition. The 2013 Berlin Film Festival opens February 7, 2013 and will close February 17.