59th Berlin International Film Festival

The 59th Berlin International Film Festival was held from 5 February to 15 February 2009. The opening film of the festival was Tom Tykwer’s The International, screened out of competition. Costa-Gavras's Eden Is West served as the closing night film at the festival. The festival's jury president was the British actress Tilda Swinton.

The Golden Bear was awarded to Peruvian film The Milk of Sorrow directed by Claudia Llosa. The retrospective dedicated to the Golden Age of 70mm filmmaking from 1955 to 1970, titled 70mm – Bigger than Life was shown at the festival.

Admission for the festival was reported to be among the highest in years, and it also set a record for ticket sales, with some 270,000 tickets sold by the halfway mark, compared to 240,000 sold for the entire run of the festival the previous year. The final ticket tally was the largest in the festival's 59-year history.

Juries
The following people were announced as being on the jury for the festival:

Main Competition

 * Tilda Swinton, British actress - Jury President
 * Isabel Coixet, Spanish filmmaker
 * Gaston Kaboré, Burkinabé filmmaker
 * Henning Mankell, Swedish writer
 * Christoph Schlingensief, German playwright and director
 * Wayne Wang, Hong Kong director, screenwriter and producer
 * Alice Waters, American author

Best First Feature Award Jury

 * Hannah Herzsprung, German actress
 * In-Ah Lee, German producer
 * Rafi Pitts, Iranian director

International Short Film Jury

 * Khavn De La Cruz, Filipino director, screenwriter and producer
 * Arta Dobroshi, Kosovo actress
 * Lars Henrik Gass, German director of the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen

Main Competition
The following films were selected in competition for the Golden Bear and Silver Bear awards:

Out of Competition
The following films were selected for the out of competition screening at the festival:

Official Awards
The following prizes were awarded by the Jury:

Main Competition

 * Golden Bear: The Milk of Sorrow by Claudia Llosa


 * Silver Bear Grand Jury Prize:
 * Adrián Biniez for Giant
 * Maren Ade for Everyone Else
 * Silver Bear for Best Director: Asghar Farhadi for About Elly
 * Silver Bear for Best Actor: Sotigui Kouyaté for London River
 * Silver Bear for Best Actress: Birgit Minichmayr for Everyone Else
 * Silver Bear for Best Screenplay: Oren Moverman and Alessandro Camon for The Messenger
 * Outstanding Artistic Contribution: György Kovács, Gábor ifj. Erdélyi and Tamás Székely for Katalin Varga (sound design)
 * Alfred Bauer Prize:
 * Andrzej Wajda for Tatarak
 * Adrián Biniez for Giant

FIPRESCI Award

 * Claudia Llosa for The Milk of Sorrow