The rich programme of this year's 50th FEST (February 25 - March 5) will present films that have won awards at prestigious film festivals.
At the opening of the 50th FEST on February 25 in the Kombank Hall, the film STRAHINJA BANOVIĆ, directed by Stefan Arsenijević, will be screened. This will be the Serbian premiere of the film that won numerous awards, including the Crystal Globe for Best Feature Film at the prestigious 55th Karlovy Vary Film Festival, as well as Best Actor Award (Ibrahim Koma) and a Special Mention for Director of Photography (Jelena Stanković) at the same festival.
The film is inspired by the epic poem ‘Banović Strahinja’, in which contemporary African migrants take the place of Serbian national heroes. Eternal and relevant today at the same time, this adaptation re-examines identity, tradition, race and love.
The film HAPPENING (L'événement), directed by Audrey Diwan, won the Golden Lion Award for Best Film at the 78th Venice Film Festival. The film deals with the issue of illegal abortions in the 1960s. It portrays a young woman who desperately wants to terminate her pregnancy in order to continue her studies, at a time when that meant the possibility of a very harsh prison sentence.
BLUE MOON (Crai nou), the first feature film by Romanian director Alina Grigore, won the Golden Seashell for Best Film at the San Sebastian Film Festival. This film story is about a woman, Irina, who struggles to receive a higher education and escape her dysfunctional family. An ambiguous sexual experience will spur her intention to fight violence in her family.
The film NITRAM won Best Actor Award (Caleb Landry Jones) in Cannes, and from the Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts (AACTA) it received the award for Best Film, Best Direction in Film (Justin Kurzel), Best Lead Actor in Film (Caleb Landry Jones), Best Lead Actress in Film (Judy Davis), Best Supporting Actor in Film (Anthony LaPaglia), Best Supporting Actress in Film (Essie Davis), Best Original Screenplay in Film and Best Editing in Film.
The film is based on the 1996 Port Arthur Massacre, one of the worst crimes in the history of Australia, in which a mass murderer killed 35 people and wounded 23 others.
Nitram lives with his mother and father in suburban Australia in the mid-1990s. He lives a life of isolation and frustration at never being able to fit in. That is until he finds a close friend in reclusive Helen. However, when that friendship meets a tragic end, Nitram's loneliness and anger grow to the point that culminates in the most heinous crime.
The film ANNETTE won the award for Best Director (Leos Carax) at the Cannes Film Festival, while actress Marion Cotillard was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy.
The drama with elements of the musical, Carax's first film in English, follows Henry, a stand-up comedian with a fierce sense of humor, and Ann, an internationally renowned opera singer. Always under the spotlight, together they form a perfect, healthy, happy and glamorous couple. However, the birth of their first child, Annette, a mysterious girl with an exceptional destiny, will change their lives completely.
The film TITANE, directed by Julia Ducournau, won the Palme d'Or in Cannes. This unusual film story, which does not fit into a certain genre, is about a young woman who survived a car accident as a child from which she suffered a severe head injury, and later in life became a murderer with strange sexual appetites. The film scandalized and shocked the audience, and the media described it as ‘the scariest and the sweetest film about a woman ever made by a woman’.
BELFAST won the People's Choice Award for Best Film at the Toronto Film Festival, as well as the Golden Globe for Best Screenplay - Motion Picture, and was recently nominated for an Oscar for Best Motion Picture of the Year, Best Achievement in Directing, Best Original Screenplay, Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role (Ciarán Hinds) and Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role (Judi Dench).
Set during the tumult of late-1960s Northern Ireland, this coming-of-age drama film follows a nine-year-old Buddy as he navigates a landscape of working-class struggle, violence and cultural changes. He dreams of a glamorous future that will whisk him far from the Troubles, but, in the meantime, he finds consolation in his charismatic family.
