Berlin film festival suspends prize over founder’s ‘Nazi links’

Alfred Bauer led the Berlinale from 1951 to 1976.

The Berlin International Film Festival has suspended a prize named after its founding director after a German newspaper reported he was a senior figure in the Nazis’ movie-making bureaucracy.

Alfred Bauer led the Berlinale from 1951 to 1976, building the festival into a major draw for then-West Berlin. It is now one of the major European film festivals.

After he died in 1986, the festival inaugurated an Alfred Bauer Prize, which has been awarded to “a feature film that opens up new perspectives in the field of cinematic art”.

It is one of several Silver Bear awards, including for best actor and director, that have been bestowed alongside the main prize, the Golden Bear.