Berlinale 2025: Golden Bear goes to Norwegian Film ‘Dreams (Sex Love)'
Some celebration before the general elections in Germany tomorrow...
The 75th Berlin International Film Festival has come to a close, and the jury of this year's edition, led by US filmmaker Todd Haynes, has elected its winner out of the 19 films in Competition.
The coveted Golden Bear for Best Film went to Drømmer (Dreams (Sex Love)) by Norwegian director Dag Johan Haugerud. It is a film about love, specifically a 17-year-old teenager's crush on her teacher, which leads her to write a confessional book about her experience. It is a smart, tender and sensitive queer coming-of-age story which caps off in his Sex / Love / Dreams trilogy – the first chapter having premiered at the Berlinale last year.
'The film is called 'Drømmer' — it's Norwegian for 'dreams' — and this was beyond my wildest dreams,' said the filmmaker, in accepting the prize from jury president Todd Haynes. 'And I will just say: Write more and read more. It expands your mind. It's very good for you.'
The trilogy is about emotional and physical intimacy. Sex focused on two straight married men discovering the elasticity of their sexuality; Love, which premiered at last year's Venice Film Festival, followed two colleagues – a heterosexual woman and a gay man – seeking a romantic connection in the new world of dating apps. Dreams is the third captivating and very talky chapter, and while it may not be one of the most singular films in Competition this year (that prize goes to Reflection in a Dead Diamond - which criminally went home empty-handed), the way it depicts the intensity of romantic awakening is palpably accurate. And funny. It features one of the greatest feminist takedowns of the film Flashdance you'll ever hear.
Our favourite for the Golden Bear, O último azul (The Blue Trail) by Brazilian director Gabriel Mascaro, had to settle for second prize – The Silver Bear Grand Jury Prize.
The film takes place in a near-future Brazil in which older citizens are celebrated with government tributes. However, the reality is that the regime now forces older people to retire and relocates them to an isolated senior housing colony so that the younger generations can focus on productivity and growth without worrying about the elderly.
As Mascaro said on stage, it's about how 'it's never too late to find new meaning in life,' but also a poetic anti-ageist parable commenting on the forced displacement of communities and the dark possibilities that could feasibly decry from an authoritarian future.
Previous Golden Bear winner Radu Jude gave the evening's most 'scandalous' moment when he won Best Screenplay for Kontinental '25 for 'expressing the dehumanizing effects of techno-capitalist society.'
The Romanian dedicated the award to Luis Buñuel, who was born on this day in 1900, expressed his hope that there would be less 'bullshit solidarity' in Europe and that the Hague would do their job regarding 'murderous bastards.'
He capped off one of the funniest speeches of the night on a political note: 'Considering that there are elections in Germany tomorrow, I just hope that next year's festival doesn't open with 'Triumph of the Will' by Leni Riefenstahl!' – referencing the German Nazi propaganda film and the alarming rise of the far-right party AfD in Germany.
Elsewhere, Argentinian director Iván Fund won the Silver Bear Jury Prize for El Mensaje about a young girl's gift for communicating with animals. Fund let out a cry of alarm for the dismantling of cinema and culture in Argentina when accepting the award for his low-key road movie.
Chinese director Huo Meng won Best Director for Living The Land, a 90s set film about how China's socio-economic transformation affected the lives of individual families across the vast nation, while Australian actress Rose Byrne won Best Leading Performance for her intense turn in Mary Bronstein's If I Had Legs I'd Kick You, in which she plays a mother on the brink of collapse.
Byrne's is a merited win as her performance burns up the screen. It is certainly the most Acting with a capital 'A' within a film she outshines, as it pummels you into submission and is let down by a lot of distracting meme casting. However, Rose Byrne's intense turn is undeniably worthy of the Bear.
Lastly, Andrew Scott won Best Supporting Performance for his turn in Richard Linklater's Blue Moon (many saw Ethan Hawke winning an acting prize for the same film), in which he plays Richard Rodgers (of the musical duo Rodgers and Hammerstein), and French filmmaker Lucile Hadžihalilović accepted the award for Best Artistic Contribution for her mesmeric fairy tale La Tour de Glace (The Ice Tower). The award goes to the filmmaking team as a whole and is awarded for its cinematography, costumes and production design.
Scroll down for the full list of winners - with our thoughts on each result.
Broadly positive vibes compared to 2024
Despite the snow and a public transport strike, this year's 75th Berlinale was a warmer, more positive feeling festival compared to last year. The audiences seem to have responded, as 330, 000 public tickets were sold this year.
The 2025 Competition selection was less hit-and-miss than previous years and the ceremony caps off a very consistent and, strangely, less politically charged festival – especially when taking into consideration the 74th Berlinale, when the closing night ceremony had some German politicians taking exception to award acceptance speeches by the Palestinian and Israeli directors of the protest documentary No Other Land. Read more on that here.
This year's edition did start off with an anti-Trump statement from jury president Todd Haynes and a fiery speech from Honorary Golden Bear winner Tilda Swinton, and while many were expecting either a repeat of last year's tensions or some more charged moments – especially considering the politically divisive mood in Berlin - the festival has admirably focused on art and movies rather than get bogged down in controversy.
Granted, several films did have had timely echoes – from opening film The Light and its clumsy grappling with liberal guilt, Radu Jude's aforementioned Kontinental '25 which delves into nationalism and corruption in Romania, to Kateryna Gornostai's touching documentary Timestamp about the effects of war on young students' lives in Ukraine. There was also one incident where a pro-Palestinian speech by Hong Kong filmmaker Jun Li in sidebar section Panorama prompted a police investigation; speaking at the premiere of his film Queerpanorama, Li read out a speech on behalf of its star actor Erfan Shekarriz, who has boycotted the festival this year in protest at his perception that it is not supportive of Palestinians.
New Berlinale head Tricia Tuttle and her team successfully dodged a repeat of last year with posts explaining the festival's stance and protocol on free speech and compared to last year, and the Berlinale has largely blocked out controversy.
Tuttle has said that the festival is committed to protecting free speech and recently told Deadline that while there is strong concern regarding the rise of the far-right in Germany with the general elections this Sunday – in which the Elon Musk-backed AfD party is projected to make significant gains – unless AfD were to gain administrative influence in Germany, she would continue the mission she was hired for.
'I'm here at the Berlinale to build a dynamic, international film festival that shows off German cinema on an international stage and also energizes local audiences. But if the country wants something that's more domestic and the government changes, then I'm not the right person for that,' she said.
Let's hope it doesn't come to that, as Tuttle's first edition has been a strong one, which has laid a good foundation for her coming years.
And let's also hope that people were listening to Ernesto Martinez Bucio tonight when he won the GFF Best First Feature Award for The Devil Smokes (and Saves the Burnt Matches in the Same Box): "If you have to choose between fear and love, always choose love."
Here is the full list of the 75th Berlinale Competition winners:
Golden Bear for Best Film: Drømmer (Dreams (Sex Love)) by Dag Johan Haugerud
Silver Bear Grand Jury Prize: O último azul (The Blue Trail) by Gabriel Mascaro
Silver Bear Jury Prize: El Mensaje (The Message) by Iván Fund
Silver Bear for Best Director: Huo Meng for Living The Land
Silver Bear for Best Leading Performance: Rose Byrne in If I Had Legs I'd Kick You
Silver Bear for Best Supporting Performance: Andrew Scott in Blue Moon
Silver Bear for Best Screenplay: Kontinental '25 by Radu Jude
Silver Bear for Outstanding Artistic Contribution: La Tour de Glace (The Ice Tower) by Lucile Hadžihalilović
Other awards:
GFF Best First Feature Award - Perspectives
The Devil Smokes (and Saves the Burnt Matches in the Same Box) by Ernesto Martinez Bucio
Berlinale Best Documentary
Holding Liat by Brandon Kramer
Shorts
Golden Bear Best Short Film: Lloyd Wong, Unfinished by Lesley Loksi Chan
Silver Bear Jury Prize Short Film: Ordinary Life by Yoriko Mizushiri
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