The Berlinale Talent Campus taps into the unique atmosphere of a great festival to bring together young talents and experienced professionals. The experience of the latter meets the inspiration of the former – a very vital platform for the film world to participate in. Since 2007, the Berlinale Talent Campus takes place in the three venues of HAU - Theater Hebbel am Ufer.

The Campus takes place parallel to the Berlinale and works as an intensive week-long academy. Creative professionals from every field of the film industry are available as speakers, teachers and partners for discussion. A number of guests from the festival's programme sections are also invited to discuss their work with the talents and thus help integrate the Campus into the Berlinale. A great number of Campus lectures and discussions are intended for the public and can be attended by anyone. Tickets are sold under the same terms as other Berlinale screenings and events.

 

Talented young people from around the world involved in all areas of filmmaking are eligible to apply to the Berlinale Talent Campus: screenwriters, directors, producers, cinematographers, actors, film editors, art directors, production designers, composers, sound designers, journalists, and visual artists. Over 350 of them are invited to Berlin to reflect on their cinematic ideas in workshops, lectures and panel discussions, and to work on their projects in specialized hands-on studios.

 

Increasing importance is given to supporting structurally weak film countries by inviting talents from these regions to take part in the Campus. A similar aim motivated the "export" of the Campus idea to other countries: meanwhile festivals in Buenos Aires (Argentina), Durban (South Africa), and Sarajevo (Bosnia-Herzegovina) are organizing their own annual Campus with the support from Berlin. The first official Talent Campus Guadalajara took place as part of the Guadalajara International Film Festival 2009 in Mexico. It has a regional focus on up-and–coming filmmakers from Central America and the Caribbean.

Each Berlinale Talent Campus attends to a focus topic to which part of the programme is dedicated and for which renown experts are invited. The Berlinale Talent Campus #8 during the Berlinale 2010 addressed the theme "Cinema Needs Talent: Looking for the Right People".

 

For many filmmakers, teaming up with the right people to inspire and support them and to create a collective vision is the essential element of successful filmmaking. The Berlinale Talent Campus 2010 tapped into these thoughts and asked how the development of personal craftsmanship and the experience of choosing the right people intertwine to build gainful long-term creative collaborations. "Teamwork is the key to success. It's about daring to ask the vital questions together in order to exceed your own limits and to keep that one essential goal in sight: to make a great film. This theme also reflects the Campus, which has, since the beginning, strived to connect young international filmmakers with their colleagues and established professionals, always in the spirit of encouraging collaborative filmmaking”, says Programme Manager Matthijs Wouter Knol.

 

The Berlinale Talent Campus is truly a joint project: initiated by Berlinale Director Dieter Kosslick, prepared and organized by a project team headed by Matthijs Wouter Knol und Christine Tröstrum, funded by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media upon a decision of the German Bundestag, in co-operation with MEDIA - Training programme of the European Union, Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg, Skillset and UK Film Council as well as 40 other partners, embassies and cultural institutes.

 

The Berlinale Talent Campus has developed into one of the most exciting initiatives of the Berlinale. Meanwhile it can boast of numerous success stories: co-operations which were conceived here, careers which began here, ideas which originated here – and their visible results can frequently be seen in the Berlinale programme. Regular cooperation also occurs at the Berlinale Co-Production Market where producers and film financiers are introduced to selected projects by Campus participants within the framework of the "Talent Project Market".

Matthijs Wouter Knol 

Christine Tröstrum

Find additional information on the Berlinale Talent Campus' own website:

 www.berlinale-talentcampus.de

Detailed information on the application process and the upcoming programme, as well as the Campus alumni's short profiles and video samples of their work. The Berlinale Talent Campus website also serves as an important networking platform for the talents both before and after the actual event.