Moritz de Hadeln


Moritz de Hadeln is a Swiss documentary film director and photographer, who became a Film Festival director. He headed the Locarno International Film Festival from 1972 to 1977, the Berlin International Film Festival from 1980 to 2001 and the Venice International Film Festival in 2002 and 2003. He was also a member of the jury at the 23rd Moscow International Film Festival.

Life

Born in 1940 in Exeter, England, de Hadeln's European family background provided him with a unique education in the Arts. His grandfather Detlev Freiherr von Hadeln was an art historian, his father Harry founded an art edition company in Florence and his mother Alexandra Bălăceanu a Romanian immigrant was a painter and sculptor. Moritz de Hadeln after obtaining the French Certificate A level, started studying Physics and Chemistry in Paris. He soon joined the film research laboratory Avenue Hoch as an apprentice. After freelancing as a photographer for some years, de Hadeln was given the opportunity to direct his first documentary Le Pèlé in 1963. Followed several years of work with cinematographer Ernest Artaria in Zurich. In 1966, de Hadeln directed his second film Ombres et Mirages and during this same period, worked as a film editor in Zürich together with Yves Allégret and as assistant director at CCC Film Studios in Berlin.
Moritz married Erika von dem Hagen in 1968. In 1969, Moritz de Hadeln and his wife founded the Nyon International Documentary Film Festival in Switzerland, which he directed until 1979. He assisted Erika when she took over as head of the festival from 1981 to 1993. In those 25 years, they made Nyon a unique meeting place for documentary filmmaking while discovering many new talents. From 1972 to 1977, de Hadeln headed the Locarno International Film Festival, heralding a new era of international recognition for the event. He gave an original profile to the newly introduced outdoor screening on the Piazza Grande and introduced several sidebar events to broaden the festival's international impact.
In 1979, de Hadeln was invited to head the Berlin International Film Festival. His aim was to establish the German event as one of the “best organized festivals in the world” by introducing among other as first festival in the world the use of computer technology for the data processing of the event. In the early 1980s, in spite of the ongoing Cold War situation in the divided city, he managed to bring East and West together at the festival. Together with Beki Probst, he founded the European Film Market. Tireless world traveller, de Hadeln was one of the first to discover the newly emerging Chinese cinema. As the Berlin Wall fell in 1989 and German unity was restored in 1990, de Hadeln was quick in seizing the opportunity to make the festival one of the most prestigious meeting places of the newly born German capital. After years of detailed planning, in 2000, he successfully managed to relocate the event in the newly rebuilt Potsdamer Platz, the historical heart of the town, while giving to the festival a new corporate identity.
In May 2001, Moritz de Hadeln founded in Berlin together with his wife Erika "de Hadeln & Partners", a company specialising in film consulting and event management.
In March 2002, as first ever non-Italian, Moritz de Hadeln was invited to head the Venice International Film Festival – part of the Venice Biennale. He directed only the two events in 2002 and in 2003. During this short period, while fighting for the independence of the event from external influences, he started together with the president of the Biennale, Franco Bernabè, to modernise its organizational infrastructure while giving it a renewed international prestige.
Finally, early in 2005 he was named Program Director of the short-lived New Montreal FilmFest of 2005, an event wanted by both Federal and Quebec governments. The first and only edition of the event, meant as work in progress, took place from 18 to 25 September 2005. In spite of the limited time available, Moritz de Hadeln and his team were able to deliver a program with over 22 world premières. But local mismanagement by those in charge of its organisation led regretfully to discontinue the event.
Both for the festivals in Nyon, Locarno and later in Berlin, Moritz de Hadeln together with his wife Erika, were the authors of several landmark retrospectives, among many others The Uzbek cinema, The New Indian Cinema, Canadian 'cinema-direct' 1958–1972, The 'March of Time' newsreels, Drew Associates 1960–1969, Selling Switzerland – Marketing Guillaume Tell, Swiss Army Film Unit, Panorama of the South East Asian Cinema and together with Hans-Joachim Schlegel: Documentary films of the Baltic Soviet Republics, Documentary Films of the Armenian Soviet Republic, Romania: the documentary films 1898–1990.
Moritz de Hadeln has served on many International Juries among others in the festivals of Karlovy Vary, Venice, Moscow, Montreal, Torino, Tehran, Damascus, Kiev and Yerevan. He is member of the European Film Academy. Swiss citizen since 1986, Moritz de Hadeln currently resides Gland, Vaud where he is from 2007 to 2011, as part of the Socialist group, a member of the Town Council. Actually he is a member of Green's local party called "Les Verts de Gland". 2018 his wife Erika died at the age of 77.

Honours