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Sepideh Farsi’s “La Sirène” (“The Siren”) is opening the Berlin Film Festival’s Panorama strand.

The program, which comprises 35 films from 30 countries, including 28 world premieres and 11 debuts, includes new films by Patric Chiha, İlker Çatak, Frauke Finsterwalder, Maite Alberdi, Milad Alami and Apolline Traoré. They feature a galaxy of well-known protagonists and actors such as Joan Baez, Jafar Panahi, Payman Maadi, George MacKay, Nathan Stewart-Jarrett, Fan Bingbing, Sandra Hüller and Susanne Wolff.

Panorama Selections

“After”

by Anthony Lapia | with Louise Chevillotte, Majd Mastoura, Natalia Wiszniewska

France

World premiere | Debut film

“All the Colours of the World Are Between Black and White”

by Babatunde Apalowo | with Tope Tedela, Riyo David, Martha Ehinome Orhiere, Uchechika Elumelu, Floyd Anekwe

Nigeria

World premiere | Debut film

“And, Towards Happy Alleys”

by Sreemoyee Singh | with Jafar Panahi, Nasrin Soutodeh, Jinous Nazokkar, Farhad Kheradmand, Aida Mohammadkhani

India

World premiere | Debut film | Documentary

“La Bête dans la...

Stars: Tavinho Teixeira, Ana Luiza Rios, Pedro Domingues, Zé Maria, Rodrigo Capistrano, Alcântra Costa, Lc Galetto | Written and Directed by Guto Parente

Cannibal movies are normally always controversial movies. Cannibal Holocaust is probably the film genre fans instantly think of when you’re asked to name a film about people eating other people but there’s a long list of banned and gory movies. Hannibal has had a TV show and many movies, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre franchise has had a few highlights, while more recently the coming of age Raw and horror western Bone Tomahawk have shocked audiences. But Brazil’s The Cannibal Club is a very different thing.

It is a kind of dark comedy about sex and cannibalism, which seems a pretty odd thing. If you were unsure what route The Cannibal Club was going to take, the first ten minutes will quickly tell you. As we...

Stars: Tavinho Teixeira, Ana Luiza Rios, Pedro Domingues, Zé Maria, Rodrigo Capistrano, Alcântra Costa, Lc Galetto | Written and Directed by Guto Parente

Cannibal movies are normally always controversial movies. Cannibal Holocaust is probably the film genre fans instantly think of when you’re asked to name a film about people eating other people but there’s a long list of banned and gory movies. Hannibal has had a TV show and many movies, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre franchise has had a few highlights, while more recently the coming of age Raw and horror western Bone Tomahawk have shocked audiences. But Brazil’s The Cannibal Club is a very different thing.

It is a kind of dark comedy about sex and cannibalism, which seems a pretty odd thing. If you were unsure what route The Cannibal Club was going to take, the first ten minutes will quickly tell you. As we...

Given the sharp rightward turn Brazilian politics has taken, “The Cannibal Club” can’t help but seem considerably more (ahem) biting than it did upon its premiere in the Rotterdam Film Festival a little over a year ago. Having a new president whose attitudes toward the underclasses are scarcely more enlightened than this horror-comedy’s protagonists certainly lends additional frisson to its fictive portrait of a wealthy elite literally eating the poor.

That heightened queasiness factor aside, however, Guto Parente’s eighth feature is a mixed bag: a diverting, stylish, but ultimately rather trite satire whose social critique and grand guignol aspects never quite come to a full boil. Uncork’d Entertainment is opening single-screen engagements in Los Angeles and San Francisco on March 1. On-demand release follows March 5.

Otavio (Tavinho Teixeira) and Gilda (Ana Luiza Rios) live in indolent luxury at their gated country home, he frying up steaks on...

Haute couture and cannibalism have been fitting cine-bedfellows since Anthony Hopkins cracked open the Chianti and fava beans back in 1989. After the more recent Raw resulted in mass festival walk-outs, Brazilian film-maker Guto Parente strives to follow suit by slapping sangrias at sun-kissed locales with axe thrashing, limb lopping and blood spitting/secreting. All by way of flesh mastication from the rich and supercilious. Otavia (Tavinho Teixeira) and Gilda (Ana Luiza Rios) are an affluent couple riding the life of Riley in a plush Brazilian beach home. But behind closed doors and phoney smiles, the pair are part of a cannibal club who meet to chow down on the remains of the hoodwinked poverty stricken, after hiring them as servants/sex slaves.

Aside from the complications that come with acquiring human flesh, there isn’t really anywhere for The Cannibal Club to go. Otavia and Gilda gazelle about protected and...

Buyers are hungry for The Cannibal Club, Guto Parente's pitch-black satire about an ultra-wealthy couple in Brazil who literally eats the poor.

The feature, which premiered at the Rotterdam International Film Festival earlier this year, has sold across Europe, with Njutafilms taking Scandinavia, Neue Donau acquiring Germany and Austria and Matchbox Films picking up rights in the U.K. and Ireland. HBO Europe has snatched up The Cannibal Club for its territories in Eastern Europe.

Uncork'd Entertainment has picked up North American rights for the feature, which stars Ana Luiza Rios and Tavinho Teixeira, and Medallion Media has the film ...

Buyers are hungry for The Cannibal Club, Guto Parente's pitch-black satire about an ultra-wealthy couple in Brazil who literally eats the poor.

The feature, which premiered at the Rotterdam International Film Festival earlier this year, has sold across Europe, with Njutafilms taking Scandinavia, Neue Donau acquiring Germany and Austria and Matchbox Films picking up rights in the U.K. and Ireland. HBO Europe has snatched up The Cannibal Club for its territories in Eastern Europe.

Uncork'd Entertainment has picked up North American rights for the feature, which stars Ana Luiza Rios and Tavinho Teixeira, and Medallion Media has the film ...