Sections

Each year the Berlinale comprises about 400 films of every genre, length and format. The festival is divided into the following sections and a mutable number of special presentations.

© Palomar 2018 © Palomar 2018

Competition

The festival's centrepiece screens the films that will be talked about.

© Peter Lindbergh © Peter Lindbergh

Berlinale Special & Berlinale Series

Space for the extraordinary, the glamorous and the festival's special concerns.

Encounters

A platform aiming to foster aesthetically and structurally daring works.

© Flóra Anna Buda © Flóra Anna Buda

Berlinale Shorts

The films of Berlinale Shorts are cinema's unsolicitied requests to take the floor and speak.

© Flatland Productions © Flatland Productions

Panorama

Sexy, edgy, daring. Panorama screens extraordinary cinema and is a traditional audience favourite.

© Ulrich Seidl Filmproduktion © Ulrich Seidl Filmproduktion

Forum & Forum Expanded

Reflection on the medium of film, social and artistic discourse and aesthetic obstinacy.

© Mo Scarpelli © Mo Scarpelli

Generation

Films that matter. For young cineastes and everyone else.

© Sabine Panossian © Sabine Panossian

Perspektive Deutsches Kino

Talented directors screen their debut films and bring a fresh impetus to the cinema with their individual styles.

© Noll Brinckmann © Noll Brinckmann

Retrospective, Berlinale Classics & Hommage

Discover film history and view it anew in screenings of the highest quality.