The 27th Sarajevo Film Festival’s In Focus programme brings the best achievements of regional cinematography from the past and this year. It is a selection of strong achievements of both already established artists and debutants that gained success at prestigious film festivals around the world or in the domestic market.
“The In Focus programme brings us some diverse films and their common characteristic is that they were the most successful films from the region last year, leaving their mark at the festivals in Venice, Sundance, Berlin, Cannes. This programme presents an overview of the best regional films from Venice 2020 to Sarajevo 2021. So the quality of the programme depends on the quality of regional films, which was above average this year. None of the A-category festivals took place without premiere screenings of regional films, which then often took the main awards. This was certainly the case with QUO VADIS, AIDA? by the most-awarded BiH director Jasmila Žbanić, which had its world premiere in the main programme of the Venice Film Festival. After the premiere, the film was screened at numerous other film festivals and has received exceptional attention, awards and reviews from the audience and critics, reaching its triumph with the nomination for the US Academy award – the Oscar – for best international film. BAD LUCK BANGING OR LOONY PORN by the Romanian now-cult director Radu Jude has won the Golden Bear for best film at this year’s Berlin Film Festival. A film from Kosovo, HIVE by Blerta Basholi, won an award at Sundance… So these are not just regional, but global films”, said Elma Tataragić, the programmer of In Focus. This programme is out of the competition.
