‘On The Adamant’ Review: Nicholas Philibert’s Berlin-Winning Documentary

EXCLUSIVE: Cinema Guild has nabbed North American rights to the feature doc Our Body directed by Venice prize winner Claire Simon (The Competition), which premiered to critical acclaim at last month’s Berlin Film Festival before touching down stateside at MoMA’s Doc Fortnight as well as True/False. Pic is slated for release in theaters later this year.

Nick Vivarelli International Correspondent The Locarno Film Festival is launching a first-of-its-kind contest, offering a free complete restoration service to a selected vintage cinema classic. The contest is part of The Swiss fest’s Heritage Online program that was launched in 2021 when its Locarno Pro industry side branched out into vintage cinema creating a platform that serves as a database of film titles that premiered prior to 2005. The goal of the fest dedicated to indie cinema is to play an active role in restoring older films to their former glory and also to become a business facilitator between rights holders and classic film distributors, streaming platforms and other outlets.

K.J. Yossman Mercury Studios, the production company behind recent Abbey Road Studios doc “If These Walls Could Sing,” have unveiled their new feature, about composer Felix Mendelssohn’s genius sister Fanny. Although Felix, who is best known for writing “The Wedding March,” is still world-renowned 175 years after his death, his sister Fanny was also a prolific musician, composing 450 works – including her own wedding music – before she died in her early 40s. “Fanny: The Other Mendelssohn” tells her story. Sheila Hayman (“Mendelssohn, The Nazis and Me”) directs the doc, which also stars classical artist Isata Kanneh-Mason bringing Mendelssohn’s works to life. Filming has taken place in Berlin, New York, London, Oxford and Buckingham Palace, where Kanneh-Mason played Queen Victoria’s piano.

K.J. Yossman “Boom! Boom: The World vs. Boris Becker,” the upcoming Apple TV+ documentary that premiered in Berlin last month, has confirmed a release date. The full two-part doc, about disgraced tennis champ Boris Becker, will drop on the streamer on April. 7. The documentary, which was directed by Alex Gibney (“Enron”) and produced by John Battsek (“Searching for Sugar Man”), promises to explore “every aspect of the man who became a tennis sensation after winning The Wimbledon Championships at the age of just 17, going on to win 49 career titles, including six Grand Slams and an Olympic gold medal, as well as his high-profile, sometimes tumultuous personal life,” according to the logline.

Bill Murray and star Jeannie Berlin set foot on the red carpet of the 2023 SAG Awards holding hands.Murray and Berlin appeared quite close when they arrived together for Sunday's soiree at the Fairmont Century Plaza in Los Angeles. The star wore a black tuxedo with a colorful bow tie, while Berlin sported an all-black suit and shades.Berlin, who portrayed Hadassah Fabelman in the Steven Spielberg film, was there for the film's nomination in the Best Ensemble Cast in a Motion Picture category.

Manori Ravindran Executive Editor of International Sideshow and Janus Films have acquired North American rights to the Berlin-premiering family drama “Tótem,” written and directed by “The Chambermaid” helmer Lila Avilés. Winner of the festival’s Ecumenical Jury Prize, the film follows seven-year-old Sol, who spends the day at her grandfather’s home, helping her aunts Nuri and Alejandra with the preparations for a surprise party they’re throwing for her father, Tonatiuh, who is terminally ill. However, as night descends, a strange and chaotic atmosphere takes over, shattering the bonds that hold the family together, and Sol will come to understand that her world will change dramatically.

Christopher Vourlias The Thessaloniki Documentary Festival kicks off its 25th edition Thursday at a time when the nonfiction genre has arguably reached unprecedented heights. This year’s festival, which takes place March 2 – 12 in the seaside Mediterranean city, unfolds just days after veteran French docmaker Nicolas Philibert won the Golden Bear in Berlin for his documentary about a Paris mental health care facility, “On the Adamant.” The award capped a fortnight in which Sean Penn’s gonzo doc about Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy, “Superpower,” also generated plenty of buzz (albeit lukewarm reviews). Meanwhile, Cameroon’s Cyrielle Raingou took home Rotterdam’s Tiger Award just a few weeks earlier for “Le Spectre de Boko Haram,” a riveting view of terrorism seen through children’s eyes. And one summer ago, Laura Poitras triumphed on the Lido with “All the Beauty and the Bloodshed,” her docu-portrait of the photographer and activist Nan Goldin, which won the Venice Film Festival’s Golden Lion award.

can be found here.MAIN COMPETITIONGolden Bear for Best Film: “On the Adamant” (“Sur l’Adamant”), Nicolas PhilibertSilver Bear Grand Jury Prize: “Afire” (“Roter Himmel”), Christian PetzoldSilver Bear Jury Prize: “Bad Living” (“Mal Viver”), Joao CanijoSilver Bear for Best Director: Philippe Garrel, “The Plough”Silver Bear for Best Leading Performance: Sofia Otero, “20,000 Species of Bees”Silver Bear for Best Supporting Performance: Thea Ehre, “Till the End of the Night”Silver Bear for Best Screenplay: Angela Schanelec, “Music”Silver Bear for Outstanding Artistic Contribution: Hélène Louvart for the cinematography of “Disco Boy”ENCOUNTERSBest Film: “Here,” Bas DevosBest Director: “The Echo,” Tatiana HuezoSpecial Jury Award: “Samsara,” Lois PatiñoSpecial Jury Award: “Orlando, My Political Biography,” Paul B. PreciadoGWFF Best First Feature Award: “The Klezmer Project,” Leandro Koch, Paloma SchachmannSpecial Mention: “The Bride,” Myriam U.

Guy Lodge Film Critic Veteran French docmaker Nicolas Philibert was the surprise winner of the Golden Bear at this year’s Berlin Film Festival, taking the prize for his film “On the Adamant,” a poignant observational study of a Paris mental health care facility. He received the award from jury president Kristen Stewart, after the star offered an extended and plainly heartfelt ode to the film’s humanity and simplicity: “People have gone in circles for thousands of years trying to pin down what can be deemed art, who’s allowed to do it and what determines its value,” she said, citing the boundary-pushing nature of the festival, and namechecking such opposing philosophers on the matter as Aristotle, Barthes, Sontag and Beavis & Butthead, before concluding, “For all of us, you just know it when you see it.”

Guy Lodge Film Critic Trends in documentary-making have shifted radically since Nicolas Philibert’s “Être et Avoir” was a surprise arthouse hit two decades ago: That sweetly observational little film, following the ins and outs of a village elementary school over the course of a year, seems a quaintly modest proposition beside today’s more slickly immersive and narrativized nonfiction breakouts. If times have changed, however, Philibert has not. “On the Adamant,” his first feature in 10 years, finds him once more examining the human workings of a care-based institution from a reserved but compassionate distance, avoiding commentary and editorialization in favor of real-life character portraiture. It turns out to be the right approach for the institution under scrutiny: The Adamant, a day-care center in central Paris for adults with a variety of mental disorders, offering its visitors a range of therapy, education and cultural activity. The human subjects here are both expressive and highly vulnerable, open to the low-key, non-invasive presence of Philibert’s camera, and the film is content to be an undulating patchwork of their everyday moods and moments, rather than anything more strenuously conceptual. Suited to specialist distributors and streaming platforms, “On the Adamant” might not achieve the crossover success Philibert has found in the past, but it’s a warm reminder of his perceptive gifts: A premiere slot in Berlin’s main competition, alongside much sleeker, more formally ambitious fiction fare, effectively welcomes him back to the auteur leagues.

Tom Whitlock, who won a Best Song Oscar for co-writing the No. 1 smash ‘Take My Breath Away’ from Top Gun and also wrote the film’s other hit single “Danger Zone,” has died. He was 68.

European Film Market which at one and the same time has underscored the challenges still facing the international independent film business.  Following by way of an industry wrap, a dozen takeaways on the 2023 Berlin market, including its Berlinale Series Market, an ever more building proposition at the Festival.  The Verdict If the European Film Market is anything to go by, broadly, the international movie market is in some ways making a international comeback, despite still vastly challenging circumstances. On Thursday, the EFM reported “record results” of a total of over 11,500 market participants from 132 countries. “It was a rather busy market, with no single must-have, but much mid-sized product,” recognizesConstantin’s Martin Moszkowicz of this year’s Berlin European Film Market, noting that Constantin received about 90 project submissions prior to market, “which is a lot.” “There’s been more deals happening at the EFM than at Sundance and we sense a new vibrancy in the international markets,” says Nick Shumaker, at Anonymous Content’s AC Independent.

Naman Ramachandran Berlin’s just concluded European Film Market (EFM), which had a physical edition this year after two online editions in 2021 and 2022 due to the pandemic, has reported “record results” according to the organizers. There were 230 stands and 612 companies from 78 countries and more than 11,500 market participants from 132 countries. Some 773 films were shown in 1,533 screenings, including 647 online screenings and 599 market premieres. The total number of buyers also rose to 1,302. 629 film projects were presented on the new Producers & Project Pages. “After the past two irregular years, we’re pleased to return to the physical in full force, and with a vibrant, bustling and strong market. The exhibition areas at Gropius Bau and the Marriott Hotel were sold out, and the exhibitors reported strong sales and good business. The decision to group all the market happenings together with the Berlinale Series Market and the market screenings at Potsdamer Platz, and to provide the industry with an efficient infrastructure, was extremely well-received by our market participants,” said EFM director Dennis Ruh.

The Berlin Film Festival has made one of its highest priorities this year to stand with “the courageous protesters in Iran as they defend themselves against a violent, undemocratic regime.”

The Good Mothers, Disney+’s hard-hitting mafia drama series, has won the first ever Berlinale Series Award.

Berlinale Series Market’s annual project pitching event, “Tipping Point” walked off Tuesday morning with the Series Mania Award. The prize is an invitation to the production’s team to present again at the industry centrepiece at next month’s Lille-based get-together, the Series Mania Forum’s Co-Pro Pitching Sessions. “Tipping Point” joins 15 other projects as a sixteenth project presented out of competition in partnership with the Berlinale Co-Production Market.  Set in the extraordinary Svalbard – an archipelago half way between the northern coast of Norway and the North Pole, it  turns on a feisty young eco-activist at constant odds with her father, an oil exec, until he is murdered. Teaming with some of his friends to investigate his death, she discovers another man from the one she knew, as she chases a stolen software which could solve climate crisis or destroy the world.

The Irish director and musician John Carney once made a movie under the working title “Can a Song Save Your Life?,” though the name was changed before it was released. And another batch of Dublin musicians of note ask a similar question in the documentary “Kiss the Future,” which premiered on Sunday at the Berlin International Film Festival and finds U2 using music to aid the occupants of a city under siege, Sarajevo.Directed by Nenad Cicin-Sain, produced by Matt Damon, Ben Affleck and Sarah Anthony and written by Bill S.

War is coming in Guy Nattiv’s Golda, onscreen and off. But despite the media’s best efforts to turn the casting of British, non-Jewish actor Helen Mirren as Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir into an explosive example of cultural appropriation, both Nattiv’s direction and Mirren’s performance are low-key and careful enough to rise above the controversy. In retrospect, it does seem a little strange that no other candidate was deemed suitable, and the movie won’t do much extra business on account of Mirren’s star power, but those anticipating a tone-deaf disaster will be sorely disappointed.

Naman Ramachandran For Indian filmmaker Sreemoyee Singh, world premiering her Iran documentary “And, Towards Happy Alleys” at the Berlin Film Festival’s Panorama strand is the culmination of a journey that began in 2015. Singh completed a masters degree in film studies at Jadavpur University, Kolkata, India and went on to pursue a PhD on The Exiled Filmmaker in Post Revolution Iranian Cinema, with the objective of understanding the source of “impossible hope” in Iranian films. The filmmaker was also introduced to the poetry of Iran’s Forogh Farrokhzad during the course and “connected deeply” to her verses. A desire to read Farrokhzad’s verses in the original Persian led Singh to learn Farsi.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief In the Alex Gibney documentary “Boom! Boom: The World vs. Boris Becker,” the then-active tennis player recalls a 1980s conversation with a tabloid newspaper editor who told him that only three subjects were guaranteed to get the German public’s attention: Adolf Hitler, German reunification and Boris Becker. Released from prison in the U.K. in December, Becker turned up in person in Berlin on Sunday to attend a press conference. Once again he dominated the court. Quotable, self-deprecating and larger than life, Becker maintained the candor that was characteristic of the multiple interviews he gave to filmmaker Alex Gibney — himself a tennis player and Becker admirer.