The principal-photography stage of Ester Ivakič’s debut feature, Ida Who Sang So Badly Even the Dead Rose up and Joined Her in Song, has concluded. Shooting lasted for 34 days during the summer months, in several locations across Slovenia, such as the flatlands in Prekmurje, the banks of the Kolpa River, and the hills near Polhov Gradec and Medvode, not far from Ljubljana. Ida Who Sang So Badly Even the Dead Rose up and Joined Her in Song is a period youth drama set in 1970s rural Slovenia, then part of Yugoslavia, and is an adaptation of the book Neither Voice, written by Suzana Tratnik.

Our titular protagonist (played by newcomer Lana Marić) is an imaginative but tone-deaf ten-year-old girl who lives with her ailing grandma (Milena Stropnik), to whom she is very attached emotionally. Persuaded by her schoolmate Terezka (fellow newcomer Liza Muršič) that song can ward off death, Ida joins the school choir in the hope that it will save her grandmother.

Ester Ivakič is a visual artist and filmmaker who already has several notable shorts (some of them award-winning on the national level), music videos and some TV work under her belt. For her feature debut, she co-wrote the script with Nika Jurman based on Tratnik’s collection of six short stories focusing on her native Prekmurje region. The rest of the cast includes Croatian actress Judita Franković Brdar (in Slovenian cinema, best known for her role in Miha Mazzini’s Erased [+leggi anche:
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scheda film]) as Ida’s mother Ivana, Matej Puc (glimpsed in Tijana Zinajić’s Bitch, a Derogatory Term for a Woman) as the girl’s father, as well as Maruša Majer, Petja Labović, Eva Stražar, Miranda Trnjanin and Mila Peršin in smaller and bit roles.

The film was lensed by Rok K Nagode, scored by Alenja Pivko Kneževič and Simon Penšek, and will be edited by Andrej Nagode. Eva Ferlan and Ina Ferlan handled the production and costume design, respectively, while Lea Bratušek served as the key make-up artist.

Ida Who Sang So Badly Even the Dead Rose up and Joined Her in Song is a Slovenian-Croatian co-production. It is being produced by Andraž and Jerca Jerič from Temporama, in co-production with RTV Slovenia, Gustav Film (producer Petra Vidmar), Film Factory (Mojca Pernat) and Croatian production company Dinaridi Film (represented by producer Tena Gojić). The film has received financial support from the Slovenian Film Centre and Creative Europe – MEDIA, while Viba Film provided technical support.