Bear tamer
Dieter Kosslick has been Berlinale Festival Director since 2001. In that time he has not only breathed new life into the festival with many original ideas, but also enhanced the standing of German cinema.
He used to write speeches for Hamburg’s Mayor Hans-Ulrich Klose, was press spokesperson of the Office for Women’s Equality and an editor of the German monthly magazine konkret. In 1983 Dieter Kosslick made the move into the film industry. He became head of the Hamburg Film Fund and then developed Filmstiftung NRW into one of Germany’s most important film funding institutions.
Since May 2001 the manager, who was born in Pforzheim, has headed up the Berlinale, the world’s most important film festival alongside Cannes and Venice. With its budget of roughly 19.5 million euros, the 12-day cultural event in February has long since become an important economic factor in the city. Kosslick and his team have played a major role in ensuring that various stars, countless fans, 4,000 journalists and 16,000 industry professionals from 130 countries travel to the Berlinale every year. While the competition for the Golden Bear is taking place at Potsdamer Platz, the European Film Market, a booming trade fair with 400 exhibitors, is held in the nearby Martin Gropius Building.
During his term of office, Kosslick has rejuvenated the old festival with lots of fresh ideas. These range from a festival kindergarten to a zero carbon footprint and also include a Culinary Cinema series for gourmets, the Talent Campus for young filmmakers and the Berlinale Flying Red Carpet that takes the festival directly to the city’s local neighbourhood cinemas. Above all, however, the standing of German cinema has been strengthened. Today at the Berlinale international successes are celebrated not only by filmmakers like Hans-Christian Schmidt, Christian Petzold and Oskar Roehler, but also by actors like Nina Hoss and Sandra Hüller. The festival director has undertaken a personal charm offensive to make sure that the overlap with the Oscar doesn’t reduce the glamour in Berlin. For example, he attempts to entice stars who are in the city filming: “If George Clooney goes for a meal at the Borchardt, I approach him to make sure he doesn’t forget the Berlinale.”
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