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Wed, Feb 16TEDDY TODAYColumn by Karin Schuppdeutsch Panorama's mystery-mongering is over: George Michael has arrived in town and stays at the Madison Hotel. Today he and director Southan Morris present their documentary "GEORGE MICHAEL: A DIFFERENT STORY" at Cinema International. A turmoil by fans is expected! Of course, everyone hoped for Michael's attendance at the Panorama reception at the "Adagio" yesterday, but unfortunately he couldn't arrange it.
Everyone wants to get an invitation to the Panorama reception - and then, everyone is disappointed that everyone else was invited too. In fact, I saw only very few celebrities like Jürgen Vogel - maybe they hid in the VIP section on the gallery. There must have been some for outside 10 Phaetons were waiting for the very important guests. Also there: filmmaker Jürgen Brüning, Zazie de Paris (as usual) and Gloria Viagra, who was, together with Ipek, the evening's DJ. She told me that her appearance in "GENDER X" would have looked differently if she only had known that "Gender X" would be screened at the Berlinale.
This year, there was only fingerfood instead of a buffet, probably to save costs for the performance of German band "Mutter" at 1 in the morning. At Berlinale Palast, you suffer some kind of arbitrary rule these days. On Friday, it was not allowed to bring bottles along, while yesterday,
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you had to leave your bag at the cloak-room while bottles were okay - and nobody could explain why. A quarter of an hour later, the ban was lifted again as otherwise, the screening would have started with a delay. In Christian Petzold's "Gespenster", Germany's third feature film in the competition section, introverted 17-year-old Nina (Julia Hummer) meets juvenile delinquent Toni (Sabine Timoteo), fells in love with her, spends a night with her und loses her the very next morning. Nina comes across a lunatic french lady who is sure that Nina is long lost her daughter, who was stolen years ago. A story about the search for identity and descent and not your ordinary lesbian lovestory, but it is worth seeing because of Nina's unusual confession of love-monologue that she gives to Toni. After "Gespenster", I watched the -rightly - praised "MY SUMMER OF LOVE" with Emily Blunt and Nathalie Press, a teenager-lovestory with everything that usually comes with it: romanticism, pathos, and tragedy. It surprisingly won the BAFTA Award for best british film and thus beat "Vera Drake" and "Harry Potter 3" among others. Nathalie Press told us that she is - in a way - nominated for an Oscar this year: the short film "Wasp", in which she plays a single mother of four, is nominated in the category "Best Short". Finally, a message to Sebastian Dungan, producer of "Transamericana" - the rest of you can stop reading! Hey, IT'S ONLY TO SEBASTIAN, I said! Okay: Denis, member of the Siegessäule-Readers-Jury is interested in you! Very much! Just introduce yourself to him at the Teddy Award ceremony... Today's Screenings
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