email print share on Facebook share on Twitter share on LinkedIn share on reddit pin on Pinterest

FESTIVALS Slovenia

The best of local cinema on show at the 19th Festival of Slovenian Film

by 

- In Portorož, Slovenia will present the very best of the country’s current batch of feature-length and short fiction, documentary and animation productions

The best of local cinema on show at the 19th Festival of Slovenian Film
Nika by Slobodan Maksimović

The 19th Festival of Slovenian Film, held in Portorož, Slovenia, kicked off yesterday and will run until Sunday 18 September, screening 98 films, 52 of which are in competition. The festival has this year received a record number of movies, 167 in total, topping last year’s number by 21. The Festival of Slovenian Film provides an overview of the Slovenian audiovisual industry, presenting the current batch of feature-length and short fiction, documentary and animated productions, which have been filmed in Slovenia in the past year.

(The article continues below - Commercial information)

Among the films competing for the Vesna Award are outstanding featuresthat have received international recognition. They include Nika [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
 by Slobodan Maksimović, awarded at Motovun and telling a coming-of-age story about a 16-year-old female go-kart racer (produced by Nora Production Group and RTV Slovenija); the Rotterdam-selected film Mother [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Vlado Škafar
film profile
]
by Vlado Škafar, giving an insight into a mother-daughter relationship, where what begins as the mother’s attempt to save her child turns into a spiritual adventure (produced by Gustav Film and Transmedia); Nightlife [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Damjan Kozole
film profile
]
by Damjan Kozole, winner of the Best Director Award at this year’s Karlovy Vary, which follows a woman forced to confront her deepest fears when her husband, a high-profile attorney, is found barely conscious and covered in blood (produced by Vertigo, Sisters and Brother Mitevski and SCCA/pro.ba); and the Tribeca- and Karlovy Vary-selected Houston, We Have a Problem! [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Žiga Virc
film profile
]
by Žiga Virc, a docu-fiction exploring the myth of the secret multi-billion-dollar deal behind America’s purchase of Yugoslavia’s clandestine space programme (produced by Studio Virc, Nukleus Film and Sutor Kolonko). Other titles include the new film by Igor Šterk, Come Along [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
, where four 13-year-olds in search of the best photo for a school competition take off from their familiar urban environment and head into a completely different world (produced by AAC Productions, Gustav Film, MB Grip and Kinorama), and Klemen Dvornik’s Buoyancy, about a young lawyer who is given a case involving the murder of a production designer, where the main suspect is her childhood friend (produced by RTV Slovenija). Find the full list of the selected films here.

The gathering also goes beyond film screenings, with a workshop for young film critics entitled “Sharpening the View”, run by the Kino! Society for Expanding Film Culture, in addition tofeaturing a rich programme of industry events, such as “RE-ACT: Successful Stories from Slovenia, Croatia and Friuli-Venezia Giulia”, “TV Series Development and Production in Slovenia” and the final session of “Scenarnica”, the first six-month screenwriting workshop organised by the Slovenian Film Centre and the Directors Guild of Slovenia.

Furthermore, this year’s recipient of the Metod Badjura Lifetime Achievement Award, the most prestigious prize in the field of Slovenian film production, has been revealed: the award will be given to production designer Dušan Milavec, best known for his work on the Academy Award winner No Man’s Land [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
by Danis Tanović.

(The article continues below - Commercial information)

Did you enjoy reading this article? Please subscribe to our newsletter to receive more stories like this directly in your inbox.

Privacy Policy