BFF11: Back to London

Well, the festival came to an end with a series of final screenings on Sunday, but I took the day off to roam around the city in the light snowfall. Seriously gorgeous. Of course, this also made me a bit nervous about my flight back to London on Monday. After having three flights cancelled on the way to Berlin, I knew my travel karma was not on solid footing. And sure enough, after driving to the airport through the still-falling snow (the Tiergarten is utterly magical under a coat of whiteness!) and checking in for my flight, it was cancelled as well. But after poking around Tegel for five hours, I got on the evening flight and was in my London home by 8pm, sifting through stacks of post and screens of email.

The picture above is what they call the "family" photo - all the winners and presenters from the awards ceremony on Saturday night gathered on stage for a final bow. And as I start to get my own reviews written, here are my 10 best films of the festival...

1. Garapa (Jose Padilha, Brazil)
2. Ander (Roberto Castón, Spain)
3. North (Rune Denstad Langlo, Norway)
4. All Around Us (Ryosuke Hashiguchi, Japan)
5. The Reader (Stephen Daldry, UK)
6. Cheri (Stephen Frears, UK)
7. The Bone Man (Wolfgang Murnberger, Austria)
8. The Messenger (Oren Moverman, US)
9. Eden Is West (Costa-Gavras, France)
10. In the Electric Mist (Bertrand Tavernier, US)

Back in London, I'll be in catch-up mode with screenings, starting with the Berlinale's opening night film, Tom Tykwer's The International, which I missed four times during the first week in February (once due to snow in London, and three times due to my cancelled flights getting to Berlin). I'm also catching up with two British horror movies, Hush and Reverb, plus the Spanish drama Little Ashes (about the relationship between Dali, Lorca and Buñuel) and Bruce Campbell's My Name Is Bruce.