Need a cheap flight to Berlin?
A week ago, it might have been costly. See the Berlin Film Festival has filled the city with stars, and has made flights to Berlin scarce.

But now as it’s beginning to wind down, it’s perfect time to hop a fight to Berlin for the weekend and check out this festival that just keeps getting better and better- seemingly politics free, and unlike Cannes, it has retained a raw, gritty feel to it, as though the films actually matter.

With more than 20 participating cinemas and venues screening 395 films and 200,000 tickets on sale, the Berlinale runs from 9-19 February) is Europe’s most user-friendly film festival. Unlike Cannes, everyone is welcome to screenings, events, talks, lectures, masterclasses and exhibitions – and they are held mostly in English. Eighteen world premieres compete for the top Golden Bear prize.

How to get there:

Festival venues:

Once you get off your flight to Berlin, head to your hotel and they’ll hand you a map. Germans love maps.

For essential Berlinale orientation, head to Potsdamer Platz.

The main screening venues here are the CinemaxX and the Cinestar multi-screens.  Stars come in with their  limos and wave to the crowds every evening just before the start of a film.

Tickets and program

Tickets for screenings and events and the free festival program in English are available from the box office in the ground floor concourse area of the Potsdamer Platz Arkaden.

The central box office and online reservations opened on 6 February.  It’s best to buy the tickets as soon as they go on sale, three days in advance of the scheduled screening date. Ticket availability depends on the film’s popularity or festival hype and most competition films sell out fast.

Tickets range from €8 up to €12 for the competition screenings. Last minute tickets are offered with 50% reductions. For up-to-date information there’s the free Berlinale iPhone app which really keeps you up to speed.

Eating and drinking:

Around Potsdamer Platz there’s major food. Caffè e Gelato  with pronto table service is immediately visible on the Arkaden’s first floor as is Salomon Bagels for example.

Freshly made juices, wraps and sandwiches are available to take away at Lindner while Oscar and Co.’s  has easy foods like  pizza in cosy, casual-chic ambience. Mom’s Favourite just opened this year on the first floor of the CinemaxX movie theatre.

For something oozing German flair and tradition try Lutter&Wegner in Weinhaus Huth in the only pre-war building left standing on Potsdamer Platz. Try a cream of pumpkin soup or half a Brandenburg duck with apple red cabbage and potato dumplings.

COA  is the best bet for a light, inexpensive Asian fried rice or miso vegetable soup in modern, slick relaxed surroundings.

Fun Events at Berlinale:

Like food and film? Then Culinary Cinema (12-17 February) is for you. A sensorial fusion of film, cooking and après-movie dining served up by five renowned chefs who will take turns to prepare special menus inspired by the evening’s screening. Tickets available online.

The Berlinale’s Tea Time readings will focus on environmental issues, and Erin Brockovich will speak on 15 February.

If you’re looking for celebs Paris Bar in Charlottenburg has been attracting the film crowd for longer than anyone can remember and everyone from Madonna to De Niro.

Filmhaus and the Billy Wilder’s bar

For the film buff. Enter the ultra-modern domed steel and glass structure erected as part of the post-Wall Potsdamer Platz developments and have a drink at Billy Wilder’s on the ground floor.

Get out!

This city is incredible. It’s cold as hell but walk across the Tiergarten, Berlin’s central park, to the Victory Column, the Siegessäule, on the Grosser Stern roundabout. Up on the viewing platform, underneath the wings of Goldelse, the goddess of victory, is the spot where the angels in Wim Wenders’ Wings of Desire discussed the fate of mankind.

Today the view stretches to the Reichstag’s glass dome. A short walk from the Berlinale Palast, tucked away in the inner courtyard of an austere modernist building is the German Resistance Memorial Centre a monument to the unsung heroes and pacifists who confronted the Nazis, including Thomas Mann and young student Sophie Scholl, who was executed.

There’s also a crazy amount of sex clubs to try if you’re getting tired of watching movies.  Start with the Kit Kat Klub. The people watching alone is worth that cheap flight to Berlin, trust me. And here everyone hits sex clubs, so don’t be shy.