27/10/2025 - Wind, Talk to Me and God Will Not Help took home the Grand Prix and Special Jury Prize, respectively, while Little Trouble Girls and DJ Ahmet collected additional gongs

The 18th edition of CinÉast - Central and Eastern European Film Festival, (10-26 October) celebrated over two weeks of screenings, talks and cultural events with an awards ceremony at Kinepolis Kirchberg in Luxembourg City, followed by a screening of Teona Strugar Mitevska’s Mother [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Teona Strugar Mitevska
film profile], which opened Venice’s Orizzonti section this summer.

Presided over by Oscar-winning Bosnian director Danis Tanović, the CinÉast international jury consisted of Polish director Maria Zbaska, Georgian-French director Akaki Popkhadze, Luxembourgish actress Sascha Ley and Luxembourgish producer Adrien Chef. Presenting the award to Stefan Đorđević’s Wind, Talk to Me [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Stefan Đorđević
film profile], Tanović praised the film’s nuanced examination of grief, which stayed with him long after the credits rolled. Just a few months back, Đorđević’s highly personal docufiction on his own contemplation of grief after the death of his mother scooped the Heart of Sarajevo for Best Film in the feature film competition after world-premiering in IFFR’s Tiger Competition.

Ley handed out the Special Jury Prize, which went to Hana Jušić’s God Will Not Help [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Hana Jušić
film profile]. The film is set in the 1900s in a remote shepherd community in Croatia and following the community dynamics upon the arrival of a Chilean woman who claims to be the widower of one of the local farmers. God Will Not Help premiered at Locarno this summer – and secured lead actresses Manuela Martelli and Ana Marija Veselčić the Pardo for Best Performance – and won the Special Award for Promoting Gender Equality at Sarajevo.

This year’s press jury of Valentin Maniglia, Hendrik Warnke and Cineuropa’s own Olivia Popp selected Little Trouble Girls [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Urška Djukić
film profile] by Urška Djukić as this year’s winner of the Critics’ Prize. The Slovene-language film, which is Djukić’s feature debut, explores a 16-year-old girl’s emotional journey, along with budding sexual and spiritual desires, during a stay at a convent with her school’s Catholic choir. The jury praised the lead performance of Jara Sofija Ostan and the film’s “provocative sense of tension that speaks to different forms of violence bubbling beneath the surface”.

The Young Talents Award was selected by a four-person jury of film students from a group of five films, with Georgi M. Unkovski’s DJ Ahmet [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Georgi M Unkovski
film profile] crowned as the winner. Igor Bezinović’s Fiume or morte! [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], the winner of this year’s Tiger Competition at IFFR, won the Audience Award.

This year’s winners:

Feature Competition

Grand Prix
Wind, Talk to Me [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Stefan Đorđević
film profile] – Stefan Đorđević (Serbia/Slovenia/Croatia)

Special Jury Prize
God Will Not Help [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Hana Jušić
film profile] – Hana Jušić (Croatia/Italy/Romania/Greece/France/Slovenia)

Critics’ Prize
Little Trouble Girls [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Urška Djukić
film profile] – Urška Djukić (Slovenia/Italy/Croatia/Serbia)

Young Talents Competition

Young Talents Award
DJ Ahmet [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Georgi M Unkovski
film profile] – Georgi M. Unkovski (North Macedonia/Czech Republic/Serbia/Croatia)

Audience Awards

Audience Award for Best Feature Film
Fiume or morte! [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] – Igor Bezinović (Croatia/Italy/Slovenia)

Audience Award for Best Short Animated Film
Balconada – Iva Tokmakcheiva (Bulgaria/France)

Audience Award for Best Short Fiction Film
Sujip – Gintarė Parulytė (Lithuania/Luxembourg/Norway)

Audience Award for Best Short Documentary Film
Confession – Rebeka Bizubová (Slovakia)