„We address each other informally, you'll have to get used to this!“ That was the first thing Thomas Hailer, director of the Kinderfilmfest, told me. I had asked if I could accompany him for one day on the Kinderfilmfest. Thomas Hailer agreed, and so I became his shadow for one day.
Most of the time he was busy to welcome people everywhere. From Anke Engelke to little kids, who asked, if they could have Berlinale-keyfobs. He was always friendly an courteous, even when a small, chubby man asked for the tenth time, if there were any tickets for "Voces Inocentes". When he was not welcoming people (and I am sure, that he shook hands with half of Berlin that day), he ran from one cinema to the other to announce the next movie, gave last instructions to the directors and actors that had come to the premieres of their movies or gave a quick interview in between.
And everything just flows very smoothly, everywhere you look, everything is prepared just well and not the slightest mistake is visible. „How is that possible in such a huge festival?“ I ask myself. But Thomas says easily: „AIt's all a matter of teamwork!“.
You can tell! Everythere are people helping, from volunteer or translater to his personal assisten Florian Weghorn. Everybody is scurrying around to make sure the festival goes on easily. And of course they don't do their work only while the Berlinale is taking place, but a whole year before. They take care of the film selection, are contacting directors and producers, work on promotion and just every matter that belongs to the festival.
What interests him most in der Kinderfilmfest, I ask Thomas and he answers, that he just likes children and he finds it important, that they start to watch good movies early. As an example he names the young actor Florian Lukas, with whom he has just been on stage to open the youth film festival 14PLUS. He had watched only bad movies on TV until he was 19, Thomas says. "And that is a pity", he goes on, "because children are the young audience and filmmakers of tomorrow."
My deep respect! Thomas Hailer and his team of 60 people manage to get a really great festival going. The recipe for success might be in the first utterance I heard form him: „We address each other informally, you'll have to get used to this!“ Have to? Merely "are allowed to". For this is how these people are dealing with each other. Very friendly, almost as if they are a small family, and that is what you really let on this festival.