Berlinale Church Service, on February 14 2010
By Martin Blaney | February 10, 2010
Ron Holloway and Dorothea Moritz at Berlinale Kamera Award ceremony, courtesy Berlinale ©2007
Berlin’s Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gedächtnis Church on Breitscheidplatz opposite the Zoo Palast Cinema will host a special church service for Berlinale visitors on Sunday, February 14, at 10.00.
The service will also pay homage to the late film critic Ron Holloway, including a reading from Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians by his widow Dorothea Moritz. The local radio station rbb kulturradio will broadcast the service live on VHF 92.4.
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Requiem for Ron
By Martin Blaney | January 23, 2010
Friends and colleagues gathered at the Arsenal-Kino at Potsdamer Platz last Sunday (January 24) to remember the life and work of Ron Holloway.
The idea for the Requiem for Ronald Holloway had come from two close friends of Ron and Dorothea Holloway, Andreas Dobers, board member of X Verleih AG, and Wilhelm Faber, special programme coordinator at the Berlinale. A programme of speakers and films featured an interview conducted by the US film journalist James Ulmer with Ron and Dorothea at the Berlinale (http://www.cinemawithoutborders.com/news/140/ARTICLE/1806/2009-03-14.html), extracts from the documentary Die Mauertänzerin, and a screening of one of the Erotic Tales, the Oscar-nominated The Dutch Master by Susan Seidelman..
In an opening speech, Berlinale director Dieter Kosslick recalled that “when one saw him, it appeared that Ron Holloway was very reserved. One often had the feeling that he was shy. Perhaps he was both reserved and shy, but he was also ambitious and determined: he just wanted to pull his magazine out of the bag!”
Kosslick spoke of Ron as “a promoter worldwide for German cinema” and regretted the fact that he would not be here to attend the 60th edition of the Berlinale. “You would be certain to have liked it – 90 German films* are going to be shown – who would have thought that a few years ago?”
Meanwhile, Volker Hassemer, former Senator for Cultural Affairs in Berlin, spoke of the „sparkle“ in Ron’s eyes and his „American-German mumbling“. „That wasn’t carelessness on his part, the way he spoke was a sign of tenderness.“
And, of course, Dr. Hassemer could not finish his reminiscence without mentioning KINO: „it was always there and he always had enough. He gave it away… and yet it was still there!“
Hanns Georg Rodek, one of the film critics at the German national daily newspaper Die Welt, recalled how in the early 1980s as a student, he had travelled to Amerika Haus in Stuttgart and become acquainted for the first time with the trade magazine Variety – and Ron’s film reviews. “Ron wrote about German films in a way that I had actually not seen in German newspapers – very down to earth, very understandable and not so oriented to the feuilleton. This may have been the moment when I thought: ‘that’s something you could perhaps also do’.“
This was then followed by extracts from the documentary Die Mauertänzerin featuring footage by Ron and Dorothea shot in 1989 of the fall of the Berlin Wall and its aftermath, and new material produced by the Berlin producers Mario and Carsten Schulz with them last year.
A rough cut of the film had been presented in a sneak preview at the beginning of November last year. Ron had been able to come from his hospital bed to attend, and Dorothea read out a text he had written the next day congratulating the producers on their work.
For film director/screenwriter Günter Reisch, Ron was the „modest, quiet American“ he spoke of warmly as a true friend who had supported him and his colleagues in the former GDR over many years. He recalled Ron’s championing of the work of Konrad Wolf and the fact that they had often seen one another at film festivals, once being together at a festival in faraway Baghdad. „We have lost an irreplaceable authority on East European cinema,“ Reisch added.
Regina Ziegler, producer of the Erotic Tales collection, and Judy Tossell, who had worked with Ron on several of the films, shared their memories of Ron before the screening of The Dutch Master rounded off the event.
„He was the captain of the Erotic Tales,“ Regina Ziegler said about Ron’s role as creative consultant. „I asked him if, as a former priest, he would accompany the Tales. I will never forget his eyes. They shone and sparkled and he said: Of course! In a week we had Bob Rafelson on board and he then phoned all of the directors he knew.“
She added that it was thanks to Ron that this collection had been shown at no less than 487 film festivals around the globe!
Working with Ron on the Erotic Tales rewarded Judy Tossell with „some very formative experiences“, as she put it: whether it was attending a screening of Mani Kaul’s contribution to the Erotic Tales in Bombay – with riots in front of the cinema against the film – or trying to (vainly) persuade Aki Kaurismaki over a long drinking session in Karlovy Vary into the early hours to join the roster of directors on the project.
„He was also the first film critic I got to know,“ she recalled. „He approached films with an openness and lack of any trace of cynicism. He always open to all people wherever we were. And when I see his smile, I always think that Ron knows something that none of us know. He has some kind of secret that he’s not sharing with us…“
* Note: One of the 90 German films screening at this year’s Berlinale is the world premiere in the Forum of a feature debut by Tatjana Turanskyj, The Drifter (Eine flexible Frau) – with Dorothea Moritz in the cast!
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Ron Holloway 1933 – 2009
By Martin Blaney | December 17, 2009
The international film festival circuit will not be the same following the sad news that the veteran film historian, critic and filmmaker Ron Holloway has died in Berlin at the age of 76.
Further Links:
Cleveland Cinematheque CinemaTalk (PDF)
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.obituaries
SIGNIS – World Catholic Association for Communication
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VDFK Honorary Award for Ron Holloway
By Martin Blaney | December 9, 2009
The Honorary Award of the German Film Critics’ Association (VDFK) goes this year to the film journalist, film historian and documentary filmmaker Ron Holloway. Hailing from Chicago, he came to Europe four decades ago and began working as a critic for such trade papers as Variety, The Hollywood Reporter and Moving Pictures.
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30 Years of KINO – German Film: How it all began …
By Martin Blaney | December 8, 2009
In 1976, Ron Holloway and Dorothea Moritz made the move from Hamburg to Berlin after Ron was invited by the newly appointed Berlinale festival director Wolf Donner to become a member of the Berlinale selection committee with responsibility for Russia. Ron also played an instrumental role in the setting up of the »German Films« sidebar which was launched at Donner’s first Berlinale in 1977 at Filmbühne am Steinplatz to spotlight certain types of cinema which had been neglected beforehand. In addition, Dorothea was on the selection committee of the Berlinale’s Kinderfilmfest from 1976 for 19 years. Three years later, in autumn 1979, a new film magazine dedicated to German cinema was born: KINO – German Film.
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German cinema well represented at Locarno International Film Festival
By Martin Blaney | August 4, 2009
German cinema is very well represented at this year’s Locarno International Film Festival (August 5-15) which will be the artistic director Frederic Maire’s fourth and last edition before he hands over the reins to Olivier Pere and takes up the running of the Swiss Cinematheque this autumn.
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Cannes 2009 Festival Report
By Ron Holloway | August 3, 2009
When Austrian director Michael Haneke’s Das weisse Band (The White Ribbon) was awarded the Golden Palm at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival, few in the press corps would disagree. After all, this was Haneke’s sixth appearance ‘in competition’, so in a sense he had already paid his dues and thus seemed, throughout the festival, to be a genuine auteur director in waiting. Patiently, he had given countless interviews with the press in order to enable wary journalists to discard some of their previous prejudices og his liking for the psycho-horror genre. Indeed, it was a pleasure to watch on ARTE, the German-French cultural channel, how both French and German commentators agreed unanimously that The White Ribbon well deserved everything it got at Cannes. And a critical boost up the ladder came the day before when the FIPRESCI International Critics Jury also voted The White Ribbon the best film of the festival.
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German Films Previews in July 2009
By Martin Blaney | July 31, 2009
New films by Andreas Dresen, Alain Gsponer, Kaspar Heidelbach and Feo Aladag were among 20 titles presented at the 8th edition of German Films Previews which was held in Cologne for the third time from July 12-15, 2009.
The annual showcase of films in the lineups of German sales companies, which was supported this year by North Rhine-Westphalia’s Ministry for Federal Affairs, Europa and Media, the Filmstiftung NRW, the City of Cologne, and the MEDIA Antenna Düsseldorf, attracted 80 international film buyers, with Thailand’s Sahamongkolfilm International, Singapore’s Lighthouse Pictures, Taiwan’s Cineplex Development and Joint Entertainment International, and Switzerland’s Filmcoopi, among others, attending for the first time.
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37th FEST Belgrade
By Ron Holloway | May 9, 2009
Alone the fact that over 90,000 admission tickets were sold made the 37th Belgrade International Film Festival – FEST (20 February to 1 March 2009) one for the books. Thanks for a roving festival staff headed by Miroljub “Mica” Vukovic, top quality entries were booked from Europe’s leading film festivals (Cannes, Venice, Locarno): Stephen Daldry’s opening film The Reader (USA/Germany), Clint Eastwood’s Changling (USA) Ron Howard’s Frost / Nixon (USA), Gus Van Sant’s Milk (USA), and Darren Arnofsky’s The Wrestler (USA). The “Horizons” section also included choice European hits: Karen Shakhnazarov’s The Vanished Empire (Russia), Matteo Garrone’s Gomorra (Italy), Paolo Sorrentino’s Il Divo (Italy), Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne’s Lorna’s Silence (Belgium/France/Italy/Germany), Tom Tykwer’s The International (USA/UK/Germany), and Laurent Cantet’s Entre les murs (The Class) (France). With a lineup like that, no wonder 90,000 avid film fans vied with every means at their disposal to beg or trade a ticket for a top-drawer international screening. Thanks to the spacious capacity of the Sava Center venue, most did not go away disappointed. Read the rest of this entry »
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Interfilm Berlin – International Short Film Festival Berlin
By Tanja Meding | April 15, 2009
Every year, during the Berlinale, Interfilm Berlin presents Golden Shorts – 12 audience favorites selected from the monthly 2008 Short Attacks screenings. This year’s selection played to a packed audience at Berlin’s renown Volksbühne venue. After presenting an exquisite slate of shorts, the audience was invited to vote for the ultimate 2008 short film. And the winner, Klaus Morschheuser’s animated Der Storch (The Stork) (Germany), is a charming short that sets the record straight about the stork delivering babies. Another favorite was British filmmaker Johnny Kelly’s animated short Procrastination (UK). A well known activity familiar to many of us, Procrastination is about doing anything but the one thing one should ought-need and must do – poetic, and to the point, a visual delight! Read the rest of this entry »
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