The Ecumenical Jury at the 75th Berlinale awarded its Prize in the Competition to the Brazilian film "O último azul" (The Blue Trail) by Gabriel Mascaro, which also won the Grand Prize (Silver Bear) of the international festival jury under jury president Todd Haynes. The Panorama Prize of the Ecumenical Jury, endowed with € 2,500, went to "The Heart is a Muscle" by Imran Hamdulay from South Africa, while the Forum Prize, also endowed with € 2,500, went to "Holding Liat" by Brandon Kramer from the USA, which was also honoured with the Berlinale Documentary Film Award.
The Golden Bear of the Berlinale 2025 was awarded to "Drømmer" (Dreams (Sex Love)) by Dag Johan Haugerud, which was also honoured by the Jury of International Film Critics (Fipresci) with its Competition Award. The film is part of the trilogy "Sex", "Dreams" and "Love". "Sex" screened at the 2024 Berlinale and won the the Panorama Prize of Ecumenical Jury, "Love" (Kjærlighet) premiered at the International Film Festival in Venice 2024.
On 13 February, the Berlinale 2025 opened with Tom Tykwer's ‘The Light’. Tykwer's first cinema film after his ten-year work on the television series ‘Babylon Berlin’ was shown in the Berlinale Specials section.
The Ecumenical Jury awards prizes in the International Competition, Panorama and Forum. The new director of the Berlinale, Tricia Tuttle, has established ‘Perspectives’ as a new section in which international feature film debuts are shown. As before, the Berlinale also includes the Generation, Berlinale Shorts, Retrospective and Berlinale Classics sections. This year's Honorary Golden Bear went to actress Tilda Swinton, while the Berlinale Camera was awarded to Dr Rainer Rother, Artistic Director of the Deutsche Kinemathek and head of the Retrospective.