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FESTIVALS Serbia

The Küstendorf Film Festival celebrates its ninth edition

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- The festival, directed by Emir Kusturica, will bring a diverse selection of films by emerging directors and established filmmakers to the Serbian mountains

The Küstendorf Film Festival celebrates its ninth edition

The ninth edition of the Küstendorf Film & Music Festival is all ready, and is set to kick off today. Every year, the event (this year unspooling from 22-27 January) attracts film lovers and renowned film professionals to the Serbian mountains. The festival, directed by two-time Palme d’Or winner Emir Kusturica, in fact takes place in Küstendorf (also known as Drvengrad and Mećavnik), the traditional village that he built near Višegrad, Serbia, for his 2004 film Life Is a Miracle. Once again this year, the gathering will bring a diverse selection of films by emerging directors and established filmmakers to this one-of-a-kind enclave.

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The opening film, Matteo Garrone's Tale of Tales [+see also:
film review
trailer
Q&A: Matteo Garrone
film profile
]
, will kick off the Contemporary Trends programme, which showcases the best films from the last few years, followed by workshops and talks with the directors or producers of the movies. Pablo Trapero's The Clan [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
, Jacques Audiard's Dheepan [+see also:
film review
trailer
Q&A: Jacques Audiard
film profile
]
, Paolo Sorrentino's Youth [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Paolo Sorrentino
film profile
]
, Corneliu Porumboiu's The Treasure [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Corneliu Porumboiu
interview: Corneliu Porumboiu
film profile
]
and Kohki Hasei's Blanka [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Kohki Hasei
film profile
]
are the rest of the award-winning films that make up the section.

The two sidebars entitled Decolonization of Film and Retrospective of Greatness will share with viewers thoughts and questions on society and cinema, respectively. The former will tackle the cinematic depiction of neocolonialism and contemporary societies, with films such as Goran Hugo Olsson's Concerning Violence [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
, Christophe Cupelin's Captain Thomas Sankara, Jean-Gabriel Periot's A German Youth [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
and Jia Zhangke's Mountains May Depart [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
. The latter, on the other hand, is dedicated to Jacques Audiard, also including a look at the work of producer Karl Baumgartner, who passed away recently, and that of František Vláčil, through lectures given by Emir Kusturica himself. 

As usual, the competition programme, reserved for short films and curated by Dunja Kusturica, will shine the spotlight on fresh and new filmmaking from all over the world. Films by Iceland's Gudmundur Arnar Gudmundsson, Spain's Pedro Collantes, Hungary's David Borbás and an array of Serbian filmmakers (Katarina Stanković, Marko Grba, Igor Simić, Maša Šarovic, Kosta Ristić and Maša Nešković), among others, will vie for the Gold, Silver and Bronze Eggs, as well as the Vilko Filač Award for Best Cinematography.

Lastly, an expertly curated programme of concerts will close each day of the festival, which will also include a presentation of works by students from Nikita Mikhalkov's Academy of Film and Theatre on the last day, when the awards will also be handed out during the closing ceremony.

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