Even though Latin American cinema has a solid performance at the Berlin Film Festival in recent years, José Padilha's Tropa de elite / Elite Squad (Brazil) and Claudia Llosa's La teta asustada / The Milk of Sorrow (Peru) have won the top prize back to back in 2008 and 2009, the 62nd edition of the Berlinale (running from February 9 - 19) wasn't as generous, with few Latin American films winning some minor prizes.
Llosa participated again at this year's festival with the film Loxoro which was awarded the Teddy Award for Best Short Film, an international prize for films with LGBT topics presented by an independent jury. Brazilian short film L by Thais Fujinaga received a Special Mention for the Deutsche Kinderhilfswerk for Best Short Film, whilst his fellow countryman Cao Hamburger was the third place in the Panorama Section Audience Award for fiction film for his feature film Xingu.
Additionally the Uruguayan-Mexican co-production La demora / The Delay by Rodrigo Plá received the Ecumenical Jury Prize and the Tagesspiegel Readers’ Jury of the Forum Section. In that same section Celina Murga's documentary film Escuela normal / Normal School (Argentina) received a Special Mention for the Caligari Award, prize sponsored by the Federal Association of Communal Film Work and the Filmdienst magazine.
