Sarajevo Movie Festival Brings the Region Closer Together
The Sarajevo Movie Festival celebrates regional and European cooperation in the film industry
September 12th, 2016
For eight days in August films dominated Sarajevo, which played host to the 22nd edition of the Sarajevo Movie Festival. The Movie Festival was originally established to help with the reconstruction of civil society and help retain the cosmopolitan spirit of the city. Today, the festival is the leading film festival in the region, recognized by both film professionals and the wider audience.
The best movie of this year's festival was the Turkish movie, “Album”, about a childless couple and their struggle to deal with the situation in a closed-minded society.
The festival brings together many organizations from around Europe in co-organizing or co-funding, and is supported by the European Union, the European Council and Creative Europe Media. Many governmental organizations from the region also support the festival, and many more from Western Europe, especially from Germany and Switzerland.
The Sarajevo Movie Festival not only helps connect countries in the Balkan region, but also always works together with a partner country. This year the partner countries are the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Mr Čamo, the head of CineLink, expressed his belief that “The partner country initiative helps build contacts between all the corners of Europe and brings valuable networking opportunities, fresh ideas and new collaborations to both our region and the guest countries”.
The movie festival also provides an opportunity for documentary movies from Southeast Europe currently in production or post-production, to receive expert and group feedback in closed screenings and one-on-one meetings.
The festival has established a think tank focused on the future of co-production markets, which looks at the issues of the future of co-production markets and how design markets can best be designed to meet the needs of the industry.
Moreover, the festival provides a platform for sharing best practices and inspiring examples from the world of drama series, and to discuss industry challenges and opportunities related to this field.