Berlin Film Festival 2024: All Of Deadline’s Movie Reviews

The Berlin Film Festival kicks off its 74th edition Thursday with the opening-night world premiere screening of Small Things Like These, the Irish drama starring Oscar-nominated Oppenheimer star Cillian Murphy. It kicks of 10 days of movie debuts including for ones starring Rooney Mara, Isabelle Huppert, Gael García Bernal, Kristen Stewart and more.

This year’s Competition lineup features films from a swath of international filmmakers including Olivier Assayas, Mati Diop, Hong Sangsoo, Bruno Dumont and Abderrahmane Sissako.

The Berlinale runs through February 25.

Keep checking back below as Deadline reviews the best and buzziest movies of the festival. Click on the titles to read the full reviews.

Another End

Section: Competition

Director: Piero Messina

Cast: Gael García Bernal, Renate Reinsve, Bérénice Bejo, Olivia Williams, Pal Aron

Deadline’s takeaway: The script, while ambitious, is laden with philosophical musings that often feel detached from the emotional core of the story. Another End never fully commits to exploring the psychological and ethical implications of its premise.

Cuckoo

Section: Berlinale Special Gala

Director: Tilman Singer

Cast: Hunter Schafer, Dan Stevens, Jessica Henwick, Marton Csókás, Mila Lieu

Deadline’s takeaway: None of this is quite coherent. It might just be nonsense. Well, it is. But there is a cheerfully willing audience for this kind of film, and it no doubt will sell a lot of popcorn.

La Cocina

Section: Competition

Director: Alonso Ruizpalacios

Cast: Raul Briones, Rooney Mara, Anna Diaz, Motell Foster, Oded Fehr, Eduardo Olmos, Laura Gomez

Deadline’s takeaway: La Cocina is like The Bear on steroids, a black-and-white pressure cooker that builds to a fierce and explosive finale. It’s an unforgettable and gripping look inside not just a restaurant kitchen but the complicated lives of the invisible people who provide its heartbeat

Small Things Like These

Section: Competition

Director: Tim Mielants

Cast: Cillian Murphy, Eileen Walsh, Michelle Fairley, Emily Watson, Clare Dunne

Deadline’s takeaway: What a vivid story this might have been if, rather than sticking to the letter of Claire Keegan’s unadorned prose, the filmmakers had embraced and taken a leap of faith into the story’s subtextual horror.