The 18th edition of the Sarajevo Film Festival will be officially opened tonight (July 6). Children of Sarajevo will open the festival, led by the director Aida Begic and the leading actors Marija Pikic and Ismir Gagula. The official Opening Ceremony will take place in the National Theatre at 8.30 p.m. The festival runs from July 6 until July 14, 2012. Competition Program is accredited by FIAPF as a specialised program for feature and documentary films from Southeast Europe. 

The Competition Programme - Feature Film gives priority to the films which will have either world or international premiere at the Sarajevo Film Festival. All the films will be shown in primetime, at the Sarajevo National Theatre. Programmer for Competition Feature and Short selection and In Focus is Elma Tataragic. The Competition Programme attracts over 150 guest directors, screen-writers, producers, actors, actresses and other people from film industry. Over the past four years, it has become the most important meeting point of the East European film.

This year’s programme showcases 7 Balkan films including:

Voice of My Father by Orhan Eskikoy (Turkey, Germany, France)

Beyond The Hill by Emin Alper (Turkey, Greece)

Redemption Street by Miroslav Terzic (Serbia)

Everybody in our family by Radu Jude (Romania)

The Woman Who Brushed Off Her Tears by Teona Strugar Mitevska (FYROM, Germany, Slovenia, Belgium)

Children of Sarajevo by Aida Begic (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Germany, France, Turkey)

Present Tense by Belmin Soylemez (Turkey)

The Competition Programme - Feature Film of 18th Sarajevo Film Festival also includes 2 Austrian films. Crossing boundaries by Florian Flicker and What is love by Ruth Mader will be screened and compete with the rest of the submissions for the following financial awards: 

Heart of Sarajevo for Best Film - in the amount of 16,000 €, provided by Council of Europe

Special Jury Prize - in the amount of  10,000 €, provided by Agnes B.

Heart of Sarajevo for Best Actress - in the amount of 2,500 € 

Heart of Sarajevo for Best Actor - in the amount of 2,500 €

This year’s Competition Programme Jury – Feature Film consists of: 

Kornel Mundruczo, President of the Jury Director, Hungary

Frederic Boyer, Tribeca Film Festival Artistic Director, France/USA

Ada Condeescu, Actress, Romania

Eva Diederix, Cofounder, Managing Director, Elle Driver, France

Igor Martinovic, Cinematographer, USA

Feature films not competing for an award at the Festival, are screened in the In Focus, which  traditionally brings the best from regional cinema from the past year, showcasing films which made considerable success at films festivals. Over the last few years, Sarajevo Film Festival has successfully promoted films from the region and discovered the now successful and respected auteurs, such as the cinematographer Arsen Anton Ostojic,winner of the Special Jury Award in 2004, Zornitza Sophia, winner in 2004 and Pjer Zalica, winner in 2003.   

"The In Focus Programme is more and more becoming a very insightful programme bringing the best of the films from the previous year which do not only represent the regional cinema but the world cinema as well" commented last year Elma Tataragic, the In Focus selector. 

This year’s In Focus section includes 4 films by Balkan auteurs: Alps by Greek Yorgos Lanthimos, Clip by Serbian Maya Milos, Beyond the Hills by Romanian Cristian Mungiu and Summer Book by recently deceased Turkish filmmaker Seyfi Teoman whose two feature films "drove Turkish film for two decades", as Guernica mentions at its official site.

COMPETITION PROGRAMME – DOCUMENTARIES 

The Sarajevo Film Festival, besides features, aims to promote recent contemporary documentary production and to support their distribution in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In 2006, Sarajevo established the Award for the Best Documentary. In addition to that, films from this selection are competing for the Human Rights Award, which is awarded to the best film dealing with the issue of human rights. Rada Sesic is the official selector of this programme. 

The Balkan feature films selected for the Competition Programme – Documentaries are:

Sofia’s Last Ambulance by Ilian Metev (Bulgaria, Croatia, Germany) 

The Boy Who Was A King by Andrey Paounov (Bulgaria, Germany) 

Family Meals by Dana Budisavljevic (Croatia)

Mustafa’s Sweet Dreams by Angelos Abatzoglou (Greece, United Kingdom, Turkey) 

Turn Off The Lights by Ivana Mladenovic (Romania)

Ich Liebe Dich by Emine Emel Balci (Turkey, Germany)

The Long Vacation by Damjan Kozole (Slovenia)

The Role of My Life by Nada Mehmedbasic (Bosnia and Herzegovina)

Heart of Sarajevo for Best Documentary Film -  in the amount of 3,000 €, provided by The Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs 

Human Rights Award - Award dealing with the subject of human rights, in the amount of 3,000 €, granted by The Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs.

This year’s Competition Programme – Documentaries jury consists of:

Thomas Imbach, Director, Producer, Switzerland

Audrius Stonys, Director, Producer, Lithuania

Damir Šagolj, Journalist, B&H