The 2019 Berlin International Film Festival won’t kick off until next Thursday, February 7, but it’s already made history. Screen Daily confirms fest artistic director Dieter Kosslick will sign the Gender Parity Pledge at a February 9 event hosted by Women in Film and Television Germany (WIFT) and Dortmund Cologne International Women’s Film Festival.
WIFT and 5050×2020, an offshoot of Le Deuxième Regard, organized the signing.
Introduced at the 2018 edition of Cannes, the Pledge is a way to hold fests accountable as they work towards full gender parity, including better transparency into their selection processes, by the year 2020. Cannes, Toronto, and Venice are among the many festivals that have signed the Pledge.
Thirty-five percent of Berlinale’s Competition films this year are women-directed, and 41 percent of the titles eligible for the festival’s top prizes, the Golden Bear and Silver Bears, are from women directors.
Kosslick remarked that, even though the festival has not reached a 50/50 gender ratio yet, the numbers this year show Berlinale is moving in the right direction. “In this year’s competition, 17 films compete for the Bear awards, seven of which are by female directors,” he explained. “Even if this still isn’t parity, this is a good development.”
Following the signing, the fest will host a discussion on gender representation in film financing, “Gender, Genre and Big Budgets,” featuring producer Gale Anne Hurd and Swedish Film Institute CEO Anna Serner.
According to the source, Berlinale will also introduce 10% for 50/50, an incentive offering rebates to gender-balanced productions created by post-production house Chimney and WIFT.
Berlinale will take place February 7-17. Accredited visitors and WIFT members can attend the Pledge signing for free, but tickets cost 15€ for members of the public. Head over to Eventbrite for more information.
