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During Cannes 2023, Universal Cinema Film & TV Journal’s Amir Ganjavie interviewed Michael Stütz, the Head of the Panorama section for the Berlin International Film Festival (Berlinale). What follows is that interview.
Amir Ganjavie, UniversalCinema Magazine (UM): Can you introduce your role in your organization?
Michael Stütz (MS): I’ve been the head of the Panorama section of the Berlin International Film Festival since 2019, but I have worked at the festival and the section since 2005. I started as an intern, then did many different things within the section, leading to being a programmer, then co-curator, before becoming the head of the section.
(UM): And what is this selection process for Panorama?
(MS): So, our selection is about 30 films each year, fiction, documentary forms, and hybrids. Usually, it’s more or less two-thirds fiction and one-third documentary. The section has existed since 1980, and we are part of the official selection, along with the Main Competition and Encounters.
It’s very important we also have an audience award because I think that makes our goal very clear. I’m always trying to define our line of curation as a sort of emotional activist. So we want to find films that evoke an emotional response in an audience, but at the same time, are not aesthetically conventional. Because I think we live in different times now, and the urgency for being topical, activist, and inclusive is equally important. This selection process is quite a long chapter each year. We start watching films after Cannes. I also work a lot with Carlo Chatrian, the Artistic Director of the festival, and his committee discussing films. A chunk of the films considered for Panorama are also discussed for the Encounters and/or Main Competition.
And then, of course, I watch films only submitted to Panorama. Maybe smaller productions, low-budget documentaries, but also fiction debuts. We are always looking out for a lot of new talents. And throughout the summer, this is more or less just me because other people in the section contracts only start in late summer or early fall. Festival work is seasonal work for many people.
During the summer, I am basically the only one watching films and then maybe discussing them with Carlo. And these screenings become more and more important because when more films are produced and ready for us very early to watch, and people are interested in feedback from the Berlin Festival, at the same time, they are also seeking other feedback from Venice, etc. And it’s very important to have transparent communication from both sides. And then it’s manageable to work with these kinds of arrangements and early decisions (selections). And sometimes, we commit very early in the summer to a film.
(UM): Oh. And so, I imagine you don’t have programmers?
(MS): I do. Of course. In September, when the official submissions open for the festival. Then the team comes back, and we have a selection committee. We have a committee of 10 people in Panorama. We brought in new people over the last few years to diversify the group with different backgrounds and socialisations, which is very important because you cannot do the job alone.
For me, it’s important to have discussions and different perspectives/opinions, and also the time to let these discussions sink in, which can often change your mind too. You always have to be open, on your toes, and listen. That’s a challenge each year, but it’s also what makes it exciting. So, ten people work on the selection for this section. We go through around 2000 feature films. They do a pre-selection, but at the same time, they’re also the Panorama’s Advisory Selection Committee.
(UM): Do you have any kind of definition for a good film?
(MS): There are no rules you can put in place because then you would sort of exclude a lot of things immediately. I think there’s what I’ve said before, a certain emotional response. I need the feeling that the film doesn’t reproduce too many tropes and stereotypes we’ve been used to seeing. We want to challenge these stereotypes. That’s very important for me. And aesthetically, there’s a big variety. We have films that, as I said, have a more topical and a more activist sort of drive. So, this is also anesthetic in itself, a candid more immediate style. And then we have bigger production art house films in the program.
(UM): I’m just curious when you are picking up the movies, how do you define independent?
(MS): For the Gala Screenings and also maybe for Main Competition, they’re studio involved sometimes. This is rare in Panorama. Take Reality, it was a very small production, with a very tiny budget. At a time when Sydney Sweeney became very famous, and the supporting actors are known character actors. But Tina Satter (the director and co-screenwriter) never made a film before. She worked in theater, and this was her first film, so there wasn’t a major studio involved (it has since been distributed by HBO Films). There was one of the LA talent agencies involved, I guess that was because of Sydney Sweeney. I met Satter when she was in Berlin preparing for a theater piece. This was the connection we had, and we got in touch and sat down and talked. For me, the film was really striking and embodied an atmosphere of general fear — And from a feminist perspective of America in the past four or five/six years. It was incredibly well-acted, very well-edited, and very minimalistic. Wonderful. It’s really, really a good film. Yeah. That’s a fantastic film.
(UM): Do films need to be World Premieres?
(MS): There are naturally more World Premieres than European Premieres, but in Panorama we have the freedom, and I always say, the privilege, of being more inclusive and having a wider spectrum of selection, which makes it easier for us to program. So there has always been a tradition of screening Sundance. In the past, there were also Toronto films coming to Berlin, but that window has become a bit too big now with the distribution in place. People don’t want to wait for five months before they do their “second act.” So it’s more Sundance and sometimes also Busan IFF with East Asian content.
And I know, for the films, it’s always wonderful to do both. You have that American market, and within a few weeks, you come to Berlin, and the films are still fresh. The market is very attentive. There might already be a bit of a buzz in the press. I invite a Sundance film rather late in the selection, basically after Sundance announces their whole lineup. And then I see which options we have and pick some titles (in 2023: Kokomo City, The Eternal Memory, Passages, etc.) We know each other very well. And have a good exchange with the programs in Sundance.
(UM): When you are selecting movies, do you consider the relationship with your sponsor or ticket sales?
(MS): Sponsorship has no direct say in Berlin. Of course, as a big festival, you want and have to be appealing to the sponsors. But they have no say in any decision-making. But yes, ticket sales are, of course, something that you have to consider. This year we had a few celebrities in Panorama. And if that works organically and comes with the content, it’s great. But we have to think of the festival as a whole. I think, since Carlo came, we are doing this more intensively. I think of our sections more like little islands, floating around in a big pond. But I also think of the festival as a whole, and of course, in that sense, you have to think about the appeal to a sponsor and ticket sales that comes with it.
(UM): When I look at the history of the Berlin Film Festival, I see that from the beginning, Berlin was a very political festival. But now I see that more festivals are becoming very political, and all festivals are starting to look the same, screening similar kinds of movies. So, I feel that there is no difference between them anymore.
(MS): Yeah. Of course, the festivals are gatekeepers, that’s pretty clear. We have to make ourselves aware and also be critical of the position of power. As I said, we have a lot of submissions, and of course, these decisions cannot be made lightly, but at the same time, we do not have that much space either. And understand what you say about possibly a danger of reproduction of similar narratives and aesthetics. But that is why it is important for me, as I said before for seeking a new cinephilia. This doesn’t always have to be an aesthetics of an old model of cinephilia or what is considered “good taste” or caters to the Western canon in the end. I think there’s a variety of visions and films out there that need to be included.
I think the audience is very open and curious, and you should never underestimate your audience. I think what you’re saying is also part of the whole system that we’re working in. The festival circuit and universe that we’re dealing with. And, in that sense, festivals became the only place for a certain type of film that is not commercial anymore that, that can’t go through chain of distribution as we knew it, like maybe 20 or 10 years ago. The festivals became the only distribution network for these films. I think that’s why it’s like this circulating model. I see a variety in Berlin, throughout all sections, from bigger productions to more experimental work. So, I think we are really also trying to bring in a sort of a bigger variety.
(UM): Yeah. I remember one of the interesting, or very challenging, films I watched in Berlin two years ago was A German Party (2022), a film about a right-wing group in Germany. This is not the kind of movie you can watch regularly at festivals. I’m curious to know, how was the reaction to that movie?
(MS): Well, this was made by Simon Brückner, who was not part of the party (AfD) but was taking a very neutral way of portraying them. That’s how he gained access. And I know it’s a challenging and confronting film, and it’s on a thin line, you know?
(UM): Yeah.
(MS): Because it could be interpreted as we gave them (AfD) the stage and [in doing so] maybe they went through this gate of being normalized. It’s always the process and the danger of right-winged democratic sort-of elected group parties. And there was a discourse about it. I think it was still important to show. We also know our audience. I think the audience was able to read the codes in there and, for me, the film was terrifying in a way. But I understand there can be different perspectives. I think it’s important to push for debate and create these spaces. Safer spaces.
We can never have fully safe spaces, but safer spaces, where we can have these discussions. That’s quite crucial. And, of course, it depends on how you compose it and which people you actually give an actual stage and a microphone.
(UM): And say you are, for example, picking movies for your section, and you’ve picked a movie, but then you realize you picked the wrong movie because you didn’t know all the context. I’m very interested in the challenges of diversity and inclusion because sometimes we don’t know all the aspects and might have an unintentional backlash against us.
(MS): Of course, that can happen. And that’s why it is important for me to have a team of people on the selection committee and that the team continues to grow more diverse with different backgrounds and perspectives. Because, and I can only speak for myself, but it is impossible to know certain things and realities outside those of your own background. So, it is important to have colleagues with different experiences and expertise. And this is why we want to work in this business because it is about communication, trust, learning, empathy, and understanding. And this is what we try to bring forward in Panorama. And I’m sure there’s still room for improvement, and we are always trying to work on this in a better way. But there’s always the possibility of making a mistake and failing. I hope it will become less as we get more inclusive and learn to listen and understand better. And also structurally, as an organisation, in society, in Germany, and in the film industry, where there’s a lot of structural racism and ignorance. It’s not only the festivals but also a trickling-down effect from funding and juries to society at large.
But things are moving at the moment and I think, as a festival maker and a curator, you have to be aware of this responsibility. In case something was overlooked, in case people feel triggered or hurt by something that was programmed. And then it is very important to deal with it in a true and honest way and be able to communicate internally and externally. And this is something where we all really need a protocol, training, and external advice too.
(UM): You mentioned that you watch movies during the summer. I’m curious about the process, how do the films come to you? Are they submitted by distributors? How do you get to know about new films?
(MS): There’s one part, with people who you’ve established a good connection. Filmmakers that you follow and are interested in. Whose projects that we track from the first pitching stages on. Because we travel to work-in-progresses and pitch festivals. Obviously, we meet a lot of the industry here (Cannes) during the festival. So, we meet a lot of sales agents, and they tell us they have films ready now.
But then every single programmer and scout has their own sort of connections as well and different territories that people are responsible for as it comes. And we have delegates from different parts of the world. People who are based in these countries or regions and specifically know what’s in production. So, they are part of the selection process too and help us know what’s about to come. It’s a big, big, big machine, basically. It’s a lot of communication.
(UM): And with the democratization of industry, there are more films produced each year. It’s now 2000 or 3000 movies. So, I imagine you are receiving lots of films from students or filmmakers that don’t have any distributor affiliated. Some programmers told me when this happens, they don’t have time to watch all the works and usually prefer films from distributors. I’m just curious if that happens to you. If not, how you are dealing with this huge quantity of films?
(MS): It is huge. And it’s becoming more and more of a challenge. Honestly, that’s also why we have to bring in more people because we felt like the year before we were drowning. After all, it’s a very short time where we have to do most of the work because of the structure that festivals work in. We don’t have the funds to employ everyone for the whole year. It would be great, but it’s just not happening. It’s not how culture works, unfortunately. So, we start September, and September is a slow start because people don’t send films early. Most people send them very late, and then it’s all in one. And then you have two months where you have to really work a lot and communicate and listen. So, it’s a challenge in itself.
But we do have an open call when people can submit their films and, if their films are in accordance with the rules and regulations of each section, then we watch them. At the moment, we are pretty good at managing. But there’s a lot of work, strategy, and planning that goes into it because otherwise, it wouldn’t work.
But there’s a lot of tracking and preciseness going into it as much as just watching films. I think the flexibility of programmers has increased. Because you have to be quick, you have to be early, there are a lot of other festivals, and we are in a privileged position that a lot of people are interested in hearing our feedback and want to come to Berlin. So that’s also part of it. But yeah, we watch all the submissions, and we have one or more comments per film, but at least one full one. And even if the head of the section, like myself, cannot see all films, I do read all the comments from my colleagues every day.
(UM): And in terms of Covid and its challenges, did it change the structure or make you think differently about the relationship between the audience and the festival?
(MS): We’ve never actually had the online experience. We were quite clear we wanted to have the physical and in-person experience. We had an online market in 21.
(UM): But in 2020, I think I watched movies online.
(MS): 2020. We were the last festival before…
(UM): 2021?
(MS): Yes. Because the market was online. But this was not open to the public.
(UM): Oh, okay.
(MS): So we had Market Week, where accredited people could watch films. And this worked very well for the films. It was the smaller selection that year because, which just couldn’t do more. We are a big industry festival but, we’re also a very big audience festival, like Venice. So we knew we had to present the films, but the pandemic wouldn’t allow us to proceed normally, inside during the winter. So we had the summer screenings because we have a lot of outdoor venues in Berlin, a lot of outdoor cinemas. So we screened for the public for two weeks in June, and all the filmmakers came. It was quite difficult at that time, but it worked, and it was a good closure for that selection and a very difficult year for us.
We learned a lot of new things in our daily work life. And some things are helping us now because we’re playing a little bit more flexibly. But the festival itself never went online for the public. And in 2022, we had a festival, even though it was also a difficult time with Omicron, and we only could fill up the theaters 50%, we still had the festival experience. Now we are back basically to the original model and structure, and the festival didn’t change much. But as I said, I think it’s more in the daily approach that things have changed. We became aware of certain things as individuals, but also as an institution festival, so to speak, in terms of workloads, mental health, how you take care of each other, and a better way. I think there are a lot of positive aspects to awareness in regard to this.
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