The Berlinale is ongoing, one of the largest film festivals in the world, 500 flicks to be seen in a few weeks time, stars in town seeing the glamorous sights like the mall at Potzdamer Platz, and a whole host of genuinely great movies. We saw our first tonight, the Chinese “Getting Home,” or literally translated “Fallen Leaves Return to Roots” — a sweetly bitter comedy about a laborer who, thanks to a drunken promise, is bringing his friend’s dead body across the country to return it to his home. Much difficulty ensues. Dead men rise and walk, sometimes just roll down mountains in giant wheels. The director, who was there, described it as a “Chinese road movie.”
It’s strange that virtually all the festival movies are translated into English. The announcers speak in English. Barely any actual German around. No wonder the French hate Hollywood.