BERLIN FILM FESTIVAL LAUNCHES NEW TALENT COMPETITION, DITCHES ENCOUNTERS

The Berlin Film Festival is to launch a new competition focusing on new talent discovery starting from next year's edition. At the same time it will drop the Encounters section.

The moves represent the first major programming shifts to be announced by the Berlinale's new festival director Tricia Tuttle.

The new stand-alone competition, Perspectives, will include up to 14 fiction debuts from all over the world, with a jury of three deciding on the best first feature award. The award is endowed with EUR50,000 euros, funded by GWFF, a society dedicated to safeguarding film and television rights.

Films selected to participate in the Perspectives competition will be curated by the festival director together with the co-directors of film programming and the section heads of Panorama, Forum and Generation.

World premieres will be given preference, but films that have already premiered in their country of origin can also be considered at the discretion of the festival director. First features may also appear in other sections, organizers explained.

"Perspectives will offer a more visible platform for exceptional emerging filmmakers from around the world. We are looking for features representing a genuinely international range of voices which have a bold and fluent cinematic language and offer arresting perspectives and new ways of seeing the world," said Tuttle. "I would like to thank the GWFF for their decades of support in our commitment to emerging filmmakers and for continuing to accompany us in the reorientation of the award."