WCF Day 2025: Poetry and Politics, Production and Visibility – Concrete Resilience Strategies in Challenging Times

The yearly WCF Day at the Berlinale is the World Cinema Fund’s (WCF) public think-tank. The 2025 WCF Day programme offered the opportunity to address key artistic and cultural policy issues in the WCF’s work. These include the need to further develop structural measures in the WCF regions, which is connected to the visibility of WCF as well as other films. It is about a further professionalisation of the industry, which can lead to more autonomy and decolonisation.

The WCF Day is organised in cooperation with Berlinale Talents.

February 19, 2025
HAU2, Hallesches Ufer 34, 10963 Berlin

Keynote
What about international film funding?
Bridges building to missing links and other dream destinations
Keynote Speaker: Dorothee Wenner (curator, filmmaker)

Director’s Talk
Chronicle of a Humanist and Transcendental Road Movie

About El mensaje (Competition) by Iván Fund
Argentina / Spain / Uruguay 2025
Life as poetic resistance. The magic of looks and gestures.
Iván Fund in conversation with Vincenzo Bugno (Head of WCF)

Talk 1
Region(s) in Focus: The Arab World
Despite tragedies, wars, contradictions and discrepancies, is this a profoundly interesting time for Arab cinema? Production, identities and artistic profiles
With Rabih El-Khoury (programmer, Lebanon / Germany), Alaa Karkouti (CEO MAD Solutions and Co-founder of the Arab Cinema Center, Egypt), Rana Eid (Sound Designer / Director, Lebanon), Talal Afifi (Producer, Sudan), Kesmat El Sayed (Producer, Egypt / Germany)
Host: Vincenzo Bugno, Head of WCF

Talk 2
Distribution: Not Only a Priority, But a Profession
The charm of pragmatism: concrete visibility, distribution and audience strategies for WCF regions and countries
With Torsten Frehse (Distributor, Germany), Semagngeta Aychiluhem (Distributor, Ethiopia), Priscilla Miranda do Rosario (Distributor, Brasil), other guests tbc
Host: Isona Admetlla, WCF Coordinator

The World Cinema Fund is an initiative of the German Federal Cultural Foundation and the Berlin International Film Festival.
The special WCF Europe programme was launched with the support of the European Union's Creative Europe MEDIA programme.