First off, for those who may not know the difference between the EFM and Berlinale, here’s a brief explanation. The Berlinale is a curated premiere film festival. Arguably the third most prominent in Europe behind Cannes and Venice. The European Film Market (EFM) is a film sales market that overlaps with the festival. The films that show in the EFM generally either come from the Berlinale lineup or are paid for by sales agents. The EFM is what predominantly drives industry attendance. And there’s hundreds of stands representing the latest or soon to be latest films, tax incentives, and more.
ID: a crowd on a red carpet outside the Berlinale Palast venue. The Berlinale Bear logo is above the marquee.
The challenge for the Berlinale, is that proportionately, the industry will spend far more time in meetings and viewing non-festival titles then the fest likely desires. However, compared to Sundance the EFM/Berlinale is a bargain.
A majority of films from last year’s Berlinale have yet to receive North American distribution. The films that did get bought generally fell into one of two categories. They were English language OR premiered in the main competition. Most notable among the non-English language acquisitions are the Oscar nominated The Teacher’s Lounge which to date has grossed over $400K via SPC and the Oscar shortlisted Totem via Janus. Janus also has Afire which grossed $244K. While not exactly brag worthy the two grosses cited are higher than all Non-English language films from Sundance 2023 except for Radical. In fact, a majority of the Berlinale main competition have sercured U.S. Distribution, whle a majority of the Sundance World Drama titles have not.
On the English language side of things the opening night film grossed $733K via Vertical. Joan Baez I Am a Noise which grossed $648K via Magnolia (Notably more than double ALL 2023 Sundance documentaries), the HBO acquired Reality, Paramount+ acquired Superpower, and two films have yet to release, Femme which was acquired by Utopia and Kiss The Future which will screen via AMC theaters later this month.
While most films at Berlinale are world premieres, they also showcase a # of Sundance titles each year. The 2023 lot included the Oscar nominated Past Lives and The Eternal Memory. Additionally the world premiere of Bleecker Street’s Golda which was also Oscar nominated and grossed $4.8 Mil domestically.
Generally speaking films premiering in Berlinale are looking at distribution deals from companies like Kino Lorber, Mubi, Film Movement, & Cinema Guild. While these companies are well respected, their abilities to offer six figure MGs are near non-existent. A very small number of titles may get deals from companies like SPC, Neon, or HBO. But those companies are largely focusing on films in the market instead of films in the festival. Further impacting Berlinale films is a reality that TIFF is taking far fewer of them as North American premieres. Last year TIFF took a total of five Berlinale world premiere films. Additionally a handfull had NA premieres at SXSW and Tribeca. A majority of which were English language titles. Unfortunately most Berlinale films will foolishly wait on a NA premiere in hopes of getting into TIFF. This only further reduces their value, when they could be making a name for themselves at top regional festivals like Seattle, Cleveland, and Milwaukee.
Of the films that don’t wait, they tend to be LGBTQIA+ titles who wisely prioritize the bay area LGBTQIA+ film festival Frameline AND/OR documentaries that will pursue Hot Docs. Berlinale has the longest running prize for queer film and so their lineup attracts a large number of queer festival programmers. The Teddy Awards also have a conference program portion which is unique to the EFM/Berlinale. On the documentary side of things, the festival has no quota but the Forum section is the largest feature film program section and is predominantely made up documentaries. Documentaries are also usually a part of both the Encounters and Main competition. And in general they get far more respect and attention overall at the Berlinale compared to at Venice and Cannes. While not a majority of the lineup anymore, they represent 3x+ % what one can expect at other premiere fests in Europe as well as at TIFF. In general doc filmmakers aare less likely to wait for a general A-List fest as NA or European premiere and instead will go for a Doc premeire fest option like Hot Docs, True/False, CPHDOX or Sheffield.
Looking ahead at the 2024 edition, the reality is festival deals are likely to be very slow, but there should be additional trickle of Sundance deals to be announced along with stragglers from TIFF. Yes, there will be pre-buys and they will likely represent the biggest deals of the market but I still would anticiapte a comparatively small number of such deals.
As for Sundance 2024.
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to B’s Film Substack to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.