{"id":11692,"date":"2026-02-13T09:56:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-13T09:56:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/11692\/"},"modified":"2026-02-13T09:56:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-13T09:56:10","slug":"michelle-yeoh-fends-off-u-s-politics-in-berlin-i-dont-know","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/11692\/","title":{"rendered":"Michelle Yeoh Fends Off U.S. Politics in Berlin: “I Don’t Know”"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tMichelle Yeoh<\/a>, this year\u2019s honorary Golden Bear recipient at the Berlin International<\/a> Film Festival, was quick to fend off questions on U.S. politics at her designated press conference.<\/p>\n

\n\tHer press conference began Friday, the morning after she accepted the prestigious prize from Anora filmmaker Sean Baker<\/a>, whom she\u2019s just worked with on a short, Sandiwara, also premiering at the Berlinale.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Wicked star was asked within minutes about what she thinks of the U.S.\u2019s political landscape. She answered: \u201cI don\u2019t think I am in the position to really talk about the political situation in the U.S., and also I cannot [\u2026] say I understand it, so it is best not to talk about something I don\u2019t know about. But I think I want to concentrate on what is important for us, which is cinema. People like to say \u2018cinema is not going to survive because there are so many other things happening, the attention span is shorter,\u2019 but I truly don\u2019t believe that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI believe when you go to the cinema, that is time for you,\u201d she continued. \u201cYou switch off your phones and you\u2019ve chosen to watch something that you want, and that is the time when you can open your hearts and free your minds and have time to yourself. Cinema is a place where we all come together, we laugh, we cry, we celebrate. So it\u2019s important to always keep that tradition alive, and I hope that\u2019s what we are here to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tA European journalist stood to tell the Malaysian actress that she is \u201cliving proof that minorities have success in Hollywood.\u201d Has she noticed any change in the diversity policies?<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt continues to be a struggle,\u201d replied Yeoh. \u201cIssues like that don\u2019t go away overnight \u2014\u00a0I\u2019ve been very blessed to be a part of some of the movies that have brought to life how lacking these roles are for minorities\u2026 At the time of Crazy Rich Asians, people said we ticked all the wrong boxes \u2014\u00a0all Asian cast, a rom-com.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cMaking movies is a risk, and our job is taking that risk because we believe that story needs to be told\u2026 Of course, we try and minimize the risk, then after Crazy Rich Asians we had Shang-Chi [and the Legend of the Ten Rings], a Marvel [film], then Everything Everywhere All at Once came, so you could see that there is change. Otherwise, I would not have been able to make Everything Everywhere All at Once\u2026 my two Daniels [directors Scheinert and Kwan], my little geniuses [were] being bold enough and it was courageous to do that, because once again we ticked all the wrong boxes. But we prevailed! That\u2019s what it is. Today, I sit here with a Golden Bear, not because of just one movie, but the perseverance, the resilience, the stubbornness to say: \u2018I won\u2019t just go away. I will stay until the right changes are made, not just for minorities, but for everyone.’\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tFamed for roles in Tomorrow Never Dies, Crazy Rich Asians and her Oscar-winning performance in Everything Everywhere All at Once, Yeoh was described by Baker on Thursday evening as \u201ca once-in-a-generation screen presence, the kind who doesn\u2019t just appear in movies, but the kind that redefines the temperature of the room. You feel it shift when she walks on screen. Suddenly, the stakes are higher.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tYeoh gave a tender and at times emotional acceptance speech, tearing up as she spoke. \u201cI feel an immense sense of gratitude and a quiet sense of wonder,\u201d she told the crowd at the Berlinale Palast. \u201cLifetime Achievement is a very big phrase \u2014\u00a0sounds like a conclusion, but I prefer to think of it as a pause, a moment to breathe, to look back, and then to keep walking forward.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tShe added: \u201cI never imagined that a girl from Malaysia who loved discipline, dance, dreaming without limits, would travel so far through stories. My path has crossed languages and cultures, continents and genres, sometimes gracefully, sometimes a little painfully, but always guided by curiosity and deep faith in cinema. Film became the place where I could hold contradictions, strength and vulnerability, seriousness and play, control and surrender. It gave me not just a career, but a life far larger than I ever dared to imagine.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Michelle Yeoh, this year\u2019s honorary Golden Bear recipient at the Berlin International Film Festival, was quick to fend…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11693,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[99],"tags":[112,760,3146,190,762,4027],"class_list":{"0":"post-11692","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-berlin","8":"tag-berlin","9":"tag-berlin-2026","10":"tag-berlin-film-festival","11":"tag-germany","12":"tag-international","13":"tag-michelle-yeoh"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11692","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11692"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11692\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11693"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11692"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11692"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11692"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}