The 9th edition of the Belgrade Free Zone Film Festival starts today and will run through November 13th.
The Free Zone is a series of programs based on the socially engaged contemporary film production aimed at addressing current social and political issues from around the world. Its purpose is to offer a completely different perspective of the world, far away from Hollywood blockbusters and mainstream cinema. The Festival organizes as well several activities such as, of course, the festival itself, held annually in Belgrade, Serbia; monthly screenings throughout the year; a festival tour of selected films from the fest in over thirty cities in Serbia; Free Zone Junior that includes a documentary workshop for high school students and training programs for elementary and high school teachers and last but not least, the Free Zone on TV that showcases on national TV a series of films from previous editions. According to the founders of the festival, Katarina Živanović and Marko Popović, Free Zone’s activities are the result of the need to raise a debate on the current social and political situation in the world and in Serbia.
So, the 9th edition of the festival will include the best engaged documentary and feature films and winners of some of the most important film festivals in the world. Through their controversial and subversive nature, these films stirred the film fest circuit’s audience and film buffs alike.
In that sense, Sophie Fiennes’ The Pervert’s Guide to Ideology starring the most controversial contemporary philosopher Slavoj Žižek as a narrator opens this year’s festival. The lineup also includes Henning Backhaus’ Local Heroes; Lucy Walker’s The Crash Reel; Vincent Dieutre’s Jaurès; Ken Loach’s The Spirit of ’45; Petra Seliškar’s Mother Europa; Philippe Le Guay’s Cycling with Molière; Alain Guiraudie’s A Stranger by the Lake; Emir Baigazin’s Harmony Lessons, The Broken Circle Breakdown by Felix Van Groeningen; Ritesh Batra’s The Lunchbox and the critically acclaimed Short Term 12 by Destin Cretton. For more information on the rest of the lineup, visit the fest’s official webpage.
The Free Zone Film Festival will also host one of the world’s most prestigious Documentary Film Festival, FID Marseille, that will present its best films from this year’s edition like for instance, Mati Diop’s A Thousand Suns which won the Gran Prix. Moreover, the festival will, again, be a meeting place for the best documentary filmmakers of the region. Srđan Keca will introduce himself to the Belgrade audience with his latest film Escape, Petra Seliškar with Mother Europe and Nebojša Slijepčević with a festival hit Gangster loves you.
It is important to mention as well that this year, a part of the program will simultaneously be premiered in the cities of Novi Sad and Niš.
Stay tuned for more information on this interesting fest!
