Critics said it was far from a vintage year at the 57th Berlin Film Festival, which ranks among the top three in Europe. But a number of standout performances drew the crowds out of the German cold and into the cinema.

The buzz centred around 'Tuya's Wedding', set in the Mongolian steppe, and German-Austrian co-production 'The Counterfeiters' about a secret bid to use concentration camp prisoners in a major currency forgery operation.

"I think in general people are quite excited about China, simply because it is one of the first times that we've had such strong films coming from China at the Berlinale," a culture reporter with British broadcaster BBC, Damien McGuinness, told AFP.

He and the chief critic for trade magazine The Hollywood Reporter, Kirk Honeycutt, highlighted the stunning performance of Yu Nan, the lead actress in 'Tuya's Wedding', one of four Asian entries in this year's competition.

The other Chinese contender, 'Lost in Beijing', is hotly awaited, not least because of a controversy over scenes axed by Chinese censors.

"Asian cinema is just huge and has been for years," Honeycutt said. "The question is not why are there four Asian competition films but why are there only four?"

He raved about the nuanced performances by the entire cast of 'The Counterfeiters', including Karl Markovics and August Diehl, who portray men faced with the wretched choice between survival and sabotaging the Nazi plot.

The two films are leading a poll of international critics by industry magazine Screen. A separate survey of German film journalists conducted by Berlin daily Der Tagesspiegel saw Robert De Niro's second outing as a director, 'The Good Shepherd', come out on top.

Starring Matt Damon as a CIA agent who compromises himself and his family for the agency cause, the nearly three-hour film was shut out of the Oscar nominations at home but won over audiences at the Berlinale.

"Bad guys are the best cinema heroes — another reason why 'The Good Shepherd' is the stand-alone favourite," Christiane Peitz of Der Tagesspiegel wrote.

McGuinness said it was also a strong year for international co-productions.

"It's very difficult to say what's English, what's French, what's German and I think that's a really positive thing," he said.

"You've got the film 'Goodbye Bafana' — every man and his dog financed that. It's a really international production and I think that worked very well."

The film, which had German, French, Belgian, British, Italian and South African backing, features Joseph Fiennes ('Shakespeare in Love') as a prison guard who grows close to Nelson Mandela, played by US actor Dennis Haysbert, during his years behind bars.

McGuinness said German actress Diane Kruger, who played Fiennes' wife in the picture, could stand a chance of capturing a Silver Bear as best actress, while Honeycutt said the good money so far was on Marion Cotillard for her turn as the iconic French torch singer Edith Piaf in 'La Vie en Rose'.

"In terms of acting that was about as good as it gets," he said.

Many critics, however, expressed disappointment at the general quality of the films in competition at the festival, which wraps up on Sunday.

"The competition seems to be a little bit all over the place," Honeycutt said. "I don't know if they just didn't have enough films to fill out the dance card but some of these films seemed to be in the wrong category."

He was particularly disappointed by acclaimed South Korean director Park Chan-Wook's film 'I'm a Cyborg but That's OK', a rambling sci-fi romantic comedy that marked a departure from his usual action pictures.

"He made the film he wanted to make but it doesn't fit his profile," Honeycutt said.

"It was almost sleep-inducing. It seemed to fail on every level. There's an art minority that seemed to like it but I though it was much ado about nothing."

The international jury, led by Hollywood screenwriter and director Paul Schrader, will award the prizes at a gala ceremony Saturday night.

AFP