Bob Rafelson opens the festival

Belgrade International Film Festival

By Rada Djurica

The program of the 35th Belgrade International Film Festival, FEST 2007, included about 50 films, acquired independently, with 130,000 people visiting the festival. As usual, the festival's policy was to present worldwide important films, as well as award-winning films, in the style of the Berlin Film Festival.

This year's festival audience saw: Apocalypto by Mel Gibson, Black Book by Paul Verhoeven, Goya's Ghosts by Milosh Forman, The Queen by Stephen Frears, Little Miss Sunshine by Johnatan Dayton & Valerie Faris, Marie Antonette by Sofia Coppola, Breaking and Entering by Anthony Minghella, The Road to Guantanamo by Michael Winterbottom, A Prairie Home Companion by Robert Altman, The Boss of it All by Lars von Trier, Babel by Alejandro Gonyales Inarrity, Volver by Pedro Almodovar, Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima by Clint Eastwood and many more.

An addition to this year's festival was a business program segment called B2B, focusing on films of "Europe out of Europe", which are European countries which are not typically included in European enterprises, or countries outside Europe with strong European influence. For the first time this year, a competitive B2B program attracted numerous interested partners from Europe, including several national cinematography and domestic film productions.

The guest of honor for FEST 2007 was Bob Rafelson, a well-known director nominated for four Academy Awards and manager of the '60s band The Monkees. A huge personality in the film industry, Rafelson came to Belgrade to open the festival.

Special homage at the festival was given to German film. The festival hosted seven domestic film premiers, as well as the Croatian Film Melon Route by Branko Schmidt (which won the Grand Prix in the International Slow Film Festival in Eger, Hungary; the Golden Arena at the Pula Film Festival and the Octavian Award at the Dubrovnik Film Festival) and Armin by Ognjen Svilacic, as part of a special program of ex-Yugoslavian films.

Also on the domestic program was The Trap by Serbian director Srdan Golubovic, which officially opened FEST 2007. The Trap premiered at the Berlin Film Festival in February 2007 and was proclaimed the first Serbian thriller (a version of "crime and punishment"). The Trap is now on the list of the best films, selected by Hollywood Reporter Magazine.

The international federation of film critics, FIPRESCI, jury reviewed all films and awarded honors to the German film The Lives of Others (Das Leben den Anderen) by Florian Henkel fon Donersmark, for the way it depicts the monitoring of East Germany by Stasi agents, with an appropriately "super-orwelian" outcome. This film also took awards at other festivals.

The jury of the "Europe out of Europe" festival competition, decided to honor the film To Get to Heaven First You Need to Die by Djamshed Usmonov for its original characters and seductive performances, along with an unpredictable and convincing story.

Finally, the B2B jury made a special mention of young Bosnian actor Armin Omerovic for his beautifully understated and touching performance in two films screened at the 35th International Film Festival FEST 2007, Armin by Ognjen Svilicic and The Melon Route by Branko Schmidt.

Reviews: The Trap (Klopka), Armin