Florian Weghorn – Berlinale Talents

PODCAST | Chiara Nicoletti interviews Florian Weghorn, Programme Manager of Berlinale Talents.

The Berlinale Talents’ programme have just been released and programme manager Florian Weghorn is back on FRED to describe all the steps that have brought to this outstanding result. Every year, at the Berlinale Talents there’s a thematic focus on which all the activities, panels and initiatives are inspired by. The 15th anniversary of the Talents introduces a very important focus: ‘Courage: Against All Odds’ and we can’t help but agree with the Florian Weghorn that this couldn’t feel timelier. On the 3rd year of a very important and successful partnership between FRED and Berlinale Talents, to be promoting courage in the cinema arts is a cause we could never miss. As in the previous years, there’s a growing network of successful Alumni coming back to the Talents to share their experience. Among them, director Ana Lily Amarpour and cinematographer Diego Garcia. There will also be what the Talents defined as “Courageous Encounters” with special guests such as this year Berlinale jury President Paul Verhoeven. 93 Films made with the contribution of 131 alumni are screening at the Berlinale and they are still counting, according to Florian Weghorn. So, Be courageous!

Berlinale Talents is an initiative of the Berlin International Film Festival, a business division of the Kulturveranstaltungen des Bundes in Berlin GmbH, funded by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media, in cooperation with Creative Europe MEDIA, a programme of the European Union, the Robert Bosch Stiftung and Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg. It was initiated in 2003. In addition to the extensive summit programme of master classes and panel discussions with top-notch experts, Berlinale Talents offers a range of Project Labs in which you can further develop and present your own project. Berlinale Talents also provides Studio programmes and workshops for specific groups of film professionals. As an initiative of the Berlin International Film Festival, the entire event is closely linked with the programmes of the festival sections and the European Film Market. While the roots of Berlinale Talents are firmly planted in Berlin new shoots of the initiative have been sprouting internationally. These Talents International editions, Talents Beirut in Lebanon, Talents Buenos Aires in Argentina, Talents Guadalajara in Mexico, Talents Durban in South Africa, Talents Sarajevo in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Talents Tokyo in Japan have the familiar structure and purpose of their German counterpart; all the while retaining a regional perspective and finding support and the necessary amenities in a locally based international film festival. Talents initiatives are supported by local partners as well as by the Goethe-Institut.