Sarajevo Film Festival Sets Competition Titles Including 15 World Premieres
The Sarajevo Film Festival will debut 15 feature films across its four competition strands during its 2025 edition, running from August 15 to 22.
A total of 50 films will compete for the festival’s Heart of Sarajevo awards. The festival’s four competition sections for feature, documentary, short, and student films will also screen six international, 28 regional, and two national premieres.
Announcing today’s batch of titles, Sarajevo Creative Director Izeta Građević, said: “The competition programs of the 31st Sarajevo Film Festival bring together filmmakers who, each from their own perspective and in various film formats and genres, explore how we live and how we survive within complex and unstable social frameworks. The backbone of this year’s competition programs are films that, transcending national boundaries, remain true to the universal stories that shape our lives. In this range – from topics that deal with today to those that question the past – this selection opens up space to remember, through film stories, what we all have in common: the need for meaning, for closeness, for understanding – ourselves and others.”
The festival said Građević and his programming team saw 1036 films, including 195 feature fiction films, 291 documentaries, and 550 short and student titles.
The Sarajevo Film Festival competition programme is open for films and filmmakers from Albania, Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Greece, Georgia, Hungary, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Malta, Moldova, Montenegro, Romania, Serbia, Slovenia, Türkiye, and Ukraine.
The jury for this year’s festival will be led by Ukrainian filmmaker Sergei Loznitsa. He will be joined by Berlinale head Tricia Tuttle, actor Dragan Mićanović, writer-actor-director Emanuel Pârvu, and writer-director Ena Sendijarević.
Here’s the full list of titles:
COMPETITION PROGRAMME – FEATURE FILM 2025
1. OTTER / VIDRA, Srđan Vuletić (Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Italy, Croatia, Kosovo*, 2025, 88 min.) – World premiere
2. STARS OF LITTLE IMPORTANCE / MINDEN CSILLAG, Renátó Olasz (Hungary, 2025, 83 min.) – World premiere
3. YUGO FLORIDA, Vladimir Tagić (Serbia, Bulgaria, France, Croatia, Montenegro, 2025, 112 min.) – World premiere
4. DJ AHMET, Georgi M. Unkovski (North Macedonia, Czech Republic, Serbia, Croatia, 2025, 99 min.) – Regional premiere
5. FANTASY, Kukla (Slovenia, North Macedonia, 2025, 98 min.) – Regional premiere
6. GOD WILL NOT HELP / BOG NEĆE POMOĆI, Hana Jušić (Croatia, Italy, Romania, Greece, France, Slovenia, 2025, 135 min.) – Regional premiere
7. SORELLA DI CLAUSURA, Ivana Mladenović (Romania, Serbia, Italy, Spain, 2025, 103 min.) – Regional premiere
8. WHITE SNAIL, Elsa Kremser, Levin Peter (Austria, Germany, 2025, 115 min.) – Regional premiere
9. WIND, TALK TO ME / VETRE, PRIČAJ SA MNOM, Stefan Đorđević (Serbia, Slovenia, Croatia, 2025, 100 min.) – Regional premiere
COMPETITION PROGRAMME – DOCUMENTARY FILM 2025
1. BOSNIAN KNIGHT / BOSANSKI VITEZ, Tarik Hodžić (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, 2025, 79 min.) – World premiere
2. I SAW A ‘SUNO’ / SUNO DIKHLEM, KATALIN BARSONY (Hungary, Belgium, 2025, 92 min.) – World premiere
3. KITE / CHARTAETOS, Thanos Psichogios (Greece, 2025, 15 min.) – World premiere
4. STEEL HOTEL SONG, Bojan Stojčić (Bosnia and Herzegovina, 2025, 19 min.) – World premiere
5. LETTERS / PISMA, Aysel Küçüksu (Bulgaria, 2025, 11 min.) – International premiere
6. MY DAD’S LESSONS / LEKCIJE MOG TATE, Dalija Dozet (Croatia, 2025, 62 min.) – International premiere
7. RED SLIDE / CRVENI TOBOGAN, Nebojša Slijepčević (Croatia, 2025, 27 min.) – International premiere
8. THIRD WORLD / TREĆI SVIJET, Arsen Oremović (Croatia, 2025, 101 min.) – International premiere
9. CUBA & ALASKA, Yegor Troyanovsky (Ukraine, France, Belgium, 2025, 93 min.) – Regional premiere
10. DIVIA, Dmytro Hreshko (Ukraine, Poland, The Netherlands, USA, 2025, 79 min.) – Regional premiere
11. DREAMERS: PEOPLE OF THE LIGHT / XƏYALPƏRƏSTLƏR: İŞIĞIN UŞAQLARI, Imam Hasanov (Azerbaijan, 2025, 86 min.) – Regional premiere
12. EVERYTIME YOU LEAVE, YOU ARE BORN AGAIN / SVAKI PUT KAD ODEŠ, PONOVO SE RAĐAŠ, Mladen Bundalo (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Belgium, 2025, 24 min.) – Regional premiere
13. I BELIEVE THE PORTRAIT SAVED ME / MUA BESOJ MË SHPËTOJ PORTRETI, Alban Muja (Kosovo*, The Netherlands, 2025, 10 min.) – Regional premiere
14. IN HELL WITH IVO, Kristina Nikolova (Bulgaria, USA, 2025, 80 min.) – Regional premiere
15. MILITANTROPOS, Yelizaveta Smith, Alina Gorlova, Simon Mozgoviy (Ukraine, Austria, France, 2025, 111 min.) – Regional premiere
16. OUR TIME WILL COME / UNSERE ZEIT WIRD KOMMEN, Ivette Löcker (Austria, 2025, 105 min.) – Regional premiere
17. THE MEN’S LAND / KACEBIS MITSA, Mariam Bakacho Khatchvani (Georgia, Hungary, 2025, 15 min.) – Regional premiere
18. SLET 1988, Marta Popivoda (Serbia, Germany, France, 2025, 22 min.) – Regional premiere
19. 9-MONTH CONTRACT, Ketevan Vashagashvili (Georgia, Bulgaria, Germany, 2025, 77 min.) – B&H premiere
20. TATA, Lina Vdovîi, Radu Ciorniciuc (Romania, Germany, The Netherlands, 2025, 82 min.) – B&H premiere
21. OHO FILM, Damjan Kozole (Slovenia, Croatia, 2025, 93 min.) – International premiere, out of competition
COMPETITION PROGRAMME – SHORT FILM 2025
1. BERNA’S EYES / SYTË E BERNËS, Ermal Gërdovci (Kosovo*, North Macedonia, 2025, 17 min.) – World premiere
2. DESERT, SHE / IERIMOS, Ioanna Digenaki (Greece, 2025, 14 min.) – World premiere
3. PROCEDURE / PROSEDÜR, Rabia Özmen (Türkiye, 2025, 18 min.) – World premiere
4. ALIȘVERIȘ, Vasile Todinca (Romania, 2025, 15 min.) – Regional premiere
5. ERASERHEAD IN A KNITTED SHOPPING BAG, Lili Koss (Bulgaria, 2025, 19 min.) – Regional premiere
6. HYSTERICAL FIT OF LAUGHTER / HISTERIČNI NAPAD SMEHA, Matija Gluščević, Dušan Zorić (Serbia, Croatia, 2025, 15 min.) – Regional premiere
7. INDEX, Radu Muntean (Romania, 2025, 28 min.) – Regional premiere
8. THE SPECTACLE, Bálint Kenyeres (Hungary, France, 2025, 17 min.) – Regional premiere
9. UPON SUNRISE / KAD SVANE, Stefan Ivančić (Serbia, Spain, Slovenia, Croatia, 2025, 15 min.) – Regional premiere
10. WINTER IN MARCH / LUMI SAADAB MEID, Natalia Mirzoyan (Armenia, Estonia, France, Belgium, 2025, 16 min.) – Regional premiere
COMPETITION PROGRAMME – STUDENT FILM 2025
1. AFTER CLASS / DUPĂ ORE, Marius Papară (Romania, 2025, 18 min.) – World premiere
2. FOUND & LOST, Reza Rasouli (Austria, 2025, 17 min.) – World premiere
3. HOME, A SPACE BETWEEN US, Effi Rabsilber (Greece, 2025, 16 min.) – World premiere
4. RAHLO, Jozo Schmuch (Croatia, 2025, 19 min.) – World premiere
5. TARIK, Adem Tutić (Serbia, 2025, 27 min.) – World premiere
6. CURFEW / KOMENDANTSKA HODYNA, Yelyzaveta Toptyhina (Ukraine, 2025, 23 min.) – International premiere
7. BACKSTROKE / SIRTÜSTÜ, Asya Günen (Türkiye, 2025, 14 min.) – Regional premiere
8. LIVING STONES / ÉLŐ KÖVEK, Jakob Ladányi Jancsó (Hungary, 2025, 20 min.) – Regional premiere
9. MILK AND COOKIES / FURSECURI ȘI LAPTE, Andrei-Tache Codreanu (Romania, 2025, 21 min.) – Regional premiere
10. PENINSULA / POLUOTOK, David Gašo (Croatia, 2025, 19 min.) – Regional premiere
11. WISH YOU WERE EAR, Mirjana Balogh (Hungary, 2025, 10 min.) – Regional premiere
