Critics Rank the Best Films and Performances From the 2013 Berlin International Film Festival

"Vic and Flo Saw a Bear"

Anna Bielak, Smells Like Screen Spirit

BEST NARRATIVE FEATURE

1. Vic and Flo Saw a Bear

2. Before Midnight

3. Frances Ha

4. Uroki Garmonii

BEST DIRECTOR

1. Denis Côté, Vic and Flo Saw a Bear

2. Ulrich Seidl, Paradise: Hope

3. David Gordon Green, Prince Avalanche

4. Andrew Bujalski, Computer Chess

5. Noach Baumbach, Frances Ha

BEST LEAD PERFORMANCE

1. Greta Gerwig, Frances Ha

2. Amanda Seyfried, Lovelace

3. Sam Rockwell, A Single Shot

4. Andrzej Chyra, In the Name of...

5. Rooney Mara, Side Effects

BEST SUPPORTING PERFORMANCE

1. Frances McDormand, Promised Land

2. Catherine Keener, Maladies

3. Peter Sarsgaard, Lovelace

BEST ENSEMBLE

1. Before Midnight

2. Hide Your Smilling Faces

3. Prince Avalanche

4. Vic and Flo Saw a Bear

5. The Broken Circle Breakdown

BEST FIRST FEATURE

1. Don Jon's Addition

2. Hide Your Smilling Faces

BIGGEST SURPRISE

1. Upstream Color

2. Frances Ha

3. Baby Blues

Adam Cook, MUBI

BEST NARRATIVE FEATURE

1. Stemple Pass

2. Before Midnight

3. Vic+Flo Saw a Bear

4. Closed Curtain

5. Nobody's Daughter Haewon

BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE

1. Yumen

BEST DIRECTOR

1. Richard Linklater, Before Midnight

2. Jafar Panahi, Closed Curtain

3. James Benning, Stemple Pass

4. Denis Côté, Vic + Flo Saw a Bear

5. Hong Sangsoo, Nobody’s Daughter Haewon

BEST LEAD PERFORMANCE

1. James Benning, Stemple Pass

2. Julie Delpy, Before Midnight

3. Ethan Hawke, Before Midnight

4. Sara Forestier, Love Battles

5. James Thiérrée, Love Battles

BEST ENSEMBLE

1. Before Midnight

BIGGEST SURPRISE

1. Computer Chess

David Hudson, Fandor

We don't yet have the hindsight to measure this year's lineup against last year's, which was pretty damn strong, but I saw a good handful of outstanding films and quite a few good ones. What's more, I've heard about many more I didn't get a chance to see that I hope to catch in the coming weeks and months. Another surprise to be added to the short list up there: Germany's relatively weak showing in the Competition. Thomas Arslan's Gold has its passages, but overall, it pales next to his In the Shadows. And the less said about Pia Marais's disappointing Layla Fourie, the better.

Overall, though, the chorus of complaints about the Berlinale's programming that crescendo'd a few years ago has subsided considerably, and even more encouraging, the festival has burst out beyond Potsdamer Platz and into neighborhoods all across the city. Screenings in more theaters than ever, with hundreds of seats each, were jam-packed. I can only concur with Dennis Lim's assessment in the NYT: with its 63rd edition, the Berlinale set off a "citywide outbreak of acute cinephilia."

BEST NARRATIVE FEATURE

1. Before Midnight

2. Closed Curtain

3. Vic + Flo Saw a Bear

4. The Strange Little Cat

5. Upstream Color

BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE

1. The Act of Killing

BEST DIRECTOR

1. Richard Linklater, Before Midnight

2. Denis Côté, Vic+Flo Saw a Bear

3. Jafar Panahi and Kamboziya Partovi, Closed Curtain

4. Ramon Zürcher, The Strange Little Cat

5. Hong Sang-soo, Nobody's Daughter Haewon

BEST LEAD PERFORMANCE

1. Luminita Gheorghiu, Child's Pose

2. Paulina García, Gloria

3. Juliette Binoche, Camille Claudel 1915

4. Jung Eunchae, Nobody's Daughter Haewon

5. Greta Gerwig, Frances Ha

BEST SUPPORTING PERFORMANCE

1. Bogdan Dumitrache, Child's Pose

2. Jean-Luc Vincent, Camille Claudel 1915

3. Mickey Sumner, Frances Ha

BEST ENSEMBLE

1. Vic + Flo Saw a Bear

2. The Strange Little Cat

3. I Used to Be Darker

4. Viola

5. Harmony Lessons

BEST FIRST FEATURE

1. The Strange Little Cat

BIGGEST SURPRISE

1. The Strange Little Cat

2. Computer Chess