14 Feb 19:00
Brecht on Film: Baal
Federal Republic of Germany, 1970, 87'
Directed by: Volker Schlöndorff
Screenplay: Volker Schlöndorff, based on Bertolt Brecht’s play of the same name
Cinematography: Dietrich Lohmann
Music: Klaus Doldinger
Cast: Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Hanna Schygulla, Margarethe von Trotta, Sigi Graue, Günther Neutze
Production: Hessischer Rundfunk, Bayerischer Rundfunk, Hallelujah Film
Volker Schlöndorff transposes Bertolt Brecht’s late-expressionist work to latter-day 1970. Poet and anarchist Baal lives in an attic and reads his poems to cab drivers. At first feted and later rejected by bourgeois society, Baal roams through forests and along motorways, greedy for schnapps, cigarettes, women and men: “You have to let out the beast, let him out into the sunlight.” After impregnating a young actress he soon comes to regard her as a millstone round his neck. He commits an unspeakable act and dies alone. “You are useless, mangy and wild, you beast, you crawl through the lowest boughs of the tree.”
The film takes youthful impetuousness and hatred of oppression as its subject and also ponders the cult of genius and sexual morals. Rainer Werner Fassbinder simultaneously plays both Baal and himself, surrounded by many actors who were later to perform in his own films.
Brecht had written Baal when he was nineteen, still in the Bavarian city of Augsburg, where he actually met this strange character, a drunkard with a guitar who was hanging out in the beer halls and chasing women and trying to get other people to pay for his drinks. This man was indeed called Baal, his family name. And Brecht was somehow looking to the wilderness of his passions and of his behaviour.
When I first came upon this work, it seemed to express so much of the feeling we had in ’68, ’69, and it had been written fifty years earlier, unbelievably, right after the First World War. Like to throw all civilization overboard, looking for the instincts, for the original passion of our genes, when we were still closer to Mother Nature. And here it was expressed, coming out of the First World War, like the German painters Otto Dix and George Grosz, indeed, in a very, let’s say, antibourgeois way. Not only the morals but the aesthetics were so antibourgeois. And then as I was looking for the character to play this part, I came upon Fassbinder, who was still doing theatre. And it seemed to, again, be such a correspondence. We shot this fifty-year-old piece of literature as if it were social reportage, contemporary to us.
Volker Schlöndorff
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Brecht on Film: Baal
14 Feb
19:00
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5,50 EUR
4,50 EUR * * EUR for younger than 25 and older than 65, as well as pensioners.
Today
22 Jan 19:00
Winter edition of the Network of Festivals in the Adriatic Region – opening night:
Forever Hold Your Peace (Živi i zdravi)
Montenegro, Serbia, Slovenia, Czech Republic, Croatia, North Macedonia, 2023, 100'
Directed by: Ivan Marinović
Written by: Ivan Marinović
Director of Photography: Dominik Istenič
Editing: Michal Reich
Music: Toni Kitanovski
Cast: Tihana Lazović, Goran Slavić, Goran Bogdan, Snježana Sinovčić, Mirjana Joković, Nikola Ristanovski
Production: Adriatic Western
Co-production: Analog Vision, Kinorama, Krug Film, Spok Film, RTCG
After the film, a conversation with director Ivan Marinović will be held.
Two days before her wedding the bride says she will not go through it even though everything is ready for the grand ceremony in a seaside town and everyone knows about it. Leso, the merciless patriarch of the groom’s family, offers this to the rebellious bride: Go forward with the wedding, go through the motions and then go wherever you want the next day. She accepts. The offended groom still hopes she will stay. The traditional wedding includes a series of absurd steps, steeped in alcohol, gunfire and dynamite. This farcical event also brings the worst of their personal anxieties into play.
This film a comedy, but it's almost like a disaster movie, where the Godzilla is a traditional Montenegrin wedding. […] When making comedy films, I prefer to make the audience laugh while feeling a sense of unease and discomfort. This indicates that the characters in the story genuinely resonate with the audience. Ivan Marinović
Ivan Marinović
Born in 1984 in Kotor. He graduated in industrial design from the Polytechnic University of Milan (2007) and received a master’s degree in film directing from the famous Prague film and television academy FAMU (2011). He is a member of the European Film Academy. Forever Hold Your Peace is his second feature film.
Filmography:
2011 Hvali more, drž’ se kraja (Praise the Sea, Stick to the Shore, short)
2016 Igla ispod praga (The Black Pin)
2023 Živi i zdravi (Forever Hold Your Peace)
2025 Hotel*** (TV series)
Between 22–29 January, free viewing of the following films will be available on the Sarajevo Film Festival's VOD platform:
Planet 7693 (Planeta 7693, by Gojko Berkuljan)
Mother Mara (Majka Mara, by Mirjana Karanović)
Family Therapy (Odrešitev za začetnike, by Sonja Prosenc)
My Late Summer (Nakon ljeta, by Danis Tanović)
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Winter edition of the Network of Festivals in the Adriatic Region – opening night: Forever Hold Your Peace (Živi i zdravi)
22 Jan
19:00
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16 Jun 19:00
Liffe after Liffe II:
Late Shift (Heldin)
Directed by and screenplay: Petra Volpe
Switzerland, Germany, 2025, 92'
Cinematography: Judith Kaufmann
Cast: Leonie Benesch (Floria Lind), Sonja Riesen (Bea Schmid), Urs Bihler (Mr. Leu), Margherita Schoch (ga. Kuhn), Jürg Plüss (Mr.. Severin), Alireza Bayram (Jan Sharif), Ridvan Murati (Mr. Osmani), Urbain Guiguemde (Nana), Selma Jamal Aldin (Amelie Afshar)
Production: Zodiac Pictures International&MMC Zodiac GmbH& SRF – Schweizer Radio und Fernsehen& SRG SSRE
Distribution: Demiurg
Festivals, awards (selection): Berlinale 2025
Relating to the experience of an overworked nurse, Petra Volpe's drama raises questions about human fallibility and empathy towards healthcare workers pushed to their limits.
Floria, a nurse, works with great dedication on the surgical ward of a Swiss hospital. She never puts a foot wrong, always has an open ear for her patients even in the most stressful of situations, and is immediately at hand in an emergency. But everyone has their own limits. When Floria arrives for the late shift one day, a nurse is absent from the fully occupied and already chronically understaffed ward. Despite the hectic pace, Floria manages to attend to a seriously ill mother and an old man urgently awaiting a diagnosis. But then she makes a disastrous mistake, setting in motion a nerve-racking race against time.
We wanted to create a physical experience for the audience. We wanted to get their heartbeat up and make people feel out of breath from just watching the film. To feel as if they had worked the shift themselves. / ... / The drama every nurse experiences on understaffed wards is that she literally can't split herself in three or four, and it's not only her who pays the price but the patients. We really wanted to honour and show the drama of that, and the camera helps, which becomes more fragmented over time because she can't split herself.
Petra Volpe
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Late Shift (Heldin)
16 Jun
19:00
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7,00 EUR
6,20 EUR * * EUR za mlajše od 25 in starejše od 65 let ter upokojence.
21 May 19:00
Liffe after Liffe II:
No Other Choice (Eojjeolsuga eobsda)
Directed by: Park Chan-wook
South Korea, France, 2025, 139'
Sinematography: Donald E. Westlake (roman), Park Chan-wook, Lee Kyoung-mi, Jahye Lee, Don McKellar
Cinematography: Kim Woo-hyung
Music: Cho Young-wuk
Cast: Lee Byung-hun (Man-soo), Son Ye-jin (Mi-ri), Park Hee-soon (Choi Seon-chul), Lee Sung-min (Goo Beom-mo), Yeom Hye-ran (Lee A Ra), Cha Seung-won (Go Si-jo), Yoo Yeon-seok (O Jin Ho), Oh Dal-su (detective), Lee Seok-hyeong (detective), Yoon Ga-yi (restaurant
owner), Choi Min-sik (shop owner)
Production: Moho Film&KG Productions; distribucija: Fivia d.o.o.
Festivals, awards (selection): Venice 2025, Toronto 2025 (Best Film), Sitges 2025, Busan 2025, New York 2025, London 2025
South Korean maestro Park Chan-wook's new film took twenty years in the making. After being unemployed for several years, a man devises a unique plan to secure a new job.
Man-su, a specialist in paper manufacturing with twenty-five years of experience, is so satisfied with life that he can truthfully tell himself, "I've got it all." While happily passing his days with his wife Miri, their two children, and two dogs, Man-su is suddenly informed by his company that he has been fired. Man-su vows to find a new job within the next three months for the sake of his family. After a year drifting from one job interview to another, he finds himself in danger of losing the very house he struggled so hard to buy. When refusals become too humiliating to bear, Man-su hatches a ruthless plan to eliminate his competition.
Some time ago, I read a novel called The Ax. I picked it up because it was written by Donald E. Westlake, who wrote the novel behind Point Blank, one of my all-time favourite films. When reading The Ax, I found myself identifying with the protagonist - a man who believes that paper manufacturing is his entire life, whether the world acknowledges it or not. I feel the same way about filmmaking, so I could easily understand the protagonist who believes there is a certain way the head of a family and a man should be, and lives his life accordingly.
Park Chan-wook
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No Other Choice (Eojjeolsuga eobsda)
21 May
19:00
21 May
19:00
Liffe after Liffe I
Liffe after Liffe II
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7,00 EUR
6,20 EUR * * EUR za mlajše od 25 in starejše od 65 let ter upokojence.
12 Apr 19:00
Liffe after Liffe II:
The Voice Of Hind Rajab (Sawt Hind Rajab)
Directed by: Kaouther Ben Hania
Tunisia, France, USA, ZDA 2025, 89'
Screenplay: Kaouther Ben Hania
Cinematography: Juan Sarmiento G.
Music: Amine Bouhafa
Cast: Saja Kilani (Rana Hassan Faqih), Motaz Malhees (Omar A. Alqam), Clara Khoury (Nisreen Jeries Qawas), Amer Hlehel (Mahdi M. Aljamal)
Production: Mime Films&Tanit Films&JW Films&RaeFilm Studios
Distribucija: Demiurg
Festivals, awards (selection): Venice 2025 (Grand Jury Prize)
A docudrama recounting the final plea of a five-year-old Gaza girl from the perspective of the medical team that tried to organize her rescue.
29 January 2024. Red Crescent volunteers receive an emergency call. A six-year-old girl is trapped in a car under fire in Gaza's Tel al-Hawa neighbourhood, pleading for rescue. The little girl describes the mangled, bloodied bodies of her family members in the car as "sleeping". While trying to keep her on the line, and convince her to keep hiding in the wreckage of her relatives' car, they do everything they can to coordinate a safe passage for an ambulance and its rescue team of paramedics to save the little girl. After a three-hour wait, rescuers are allowed, by the Israeli military, to dispatch an ambulance to the car where Rajab spoke from. A feverish race against time begins.
I heard an audio recording of Hind Rajab begging for help. /.../ After listening to it, I knew, without a doubt, that I had to drop everything else. I had to make this film. /.../ I cannot accept a world where a child calls for help and no one comes. That pain, that failure, belongs to all of us. This story is not just about Gaza. It speaks to a universal grief. And I believe that fiction (especially when it draws from verified, painful, real events) is cinema's most powerful tool. More powerful than the noise of breaking news or the forgetfulness of scrolling. Cinema can preserve a memory. Cinema can resist amnesia. May Hind Rajab's voice be heard.
Kaouther ben Hania
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The Voice Of Hind Rajab (Sawt Hind Rajab)
12 Apr
19:00
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7,00 EUR
6,20 EUR * * EUR for younger than 25 and older than 65, as well as pensioners.
6 Mar 19:00
Liffe after Liffe II:
Dreams
Directed by and screenplay: Michel Franco
Mexico, USA, 2025, 100'
Cinematography: Yves Cape
Cast: Jessica Chastain (Jennifer McCarthy), Isaac Hernández (Fernando Rodríguez), Rupert Friend (Jake McCarthy), Marshall Bell (Michael McCarthy), Eligio Meléndez (Fernando’s Father), Mercedes Hernández (Fernando’s Mother)
Production: Teorema&Freckle Films&AR Content&Eastern Film Investmen
Distribution: Fivia d.o.o.
Festivals, awards (selection): Berlinale 2025
Exploring a turbulent relationship between an American philanthropist and a young Mexican ballet dancer, the erotic drama provides a penetrating social critique of contemporary colonial mentality while taking a prescient look at immigration.
Fernando, a prodigiously talented ballet dancer from Mexico, dreams of international fame and life in the US. Believing that his lover Jennifer, a socialite and philanthropist, will support him, he leaves everything behind and narrowly escapes death while crossing the border illegally. His arrival in San Francisco, however, disrupts Jennifer's carefully curated world. She will do anything to protect their future together - and the life she has built for herself.
I'm just a filmmaker. For me, it would be enough if my fellow Mexican immigrants and every other immigrant were acknowledged for the good job they're doing. How to solve the border? I'm just a filmmaker and I know this movie raises a lot of questions, but I cannot give any answers. Also, I made a story that is mainly intimate story of this couple. Sometimes I do tackle things in another fashion, but in this case, I'm focusing on this intimate story.
Michel Franco
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Dreams
6 Mar
19:00
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7,00 EUR
6,20 EUR * * EUR for younger than 25 and older than 65, as well as pensioners.
20 Feb 19:00
Liffe after Liffe II:
Sentimental Value (Affeksjonsverdi)
Directed by: Joachim Trier
Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Germany, France, UK, 2025, 135'
Screenplay: Joachim Trier, Eskil Vogt
Cinematography: Kasper Tuxen
Music: Hania Rani
Cast: Renate Reinsve (Nora Borg), Stellan Skarsgård (Gustav Borg), Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas (Agnes Borg Pettersen), Elle Fanning (Rachel Kemp), Anders Danielsen Lie (Jakob), Jesper Christensen (Michael), Lena Endre (Ingrid Berger)
Production: Mer Film&Eye Eye Pictures&Komplizen Film&MK Productions&Lumen&BBC Film&Zentropa
Distribution: Karantanija Cinemas
Festivals, awards (selection): Cannes 2025 (Grand Prix), Sydney 2025, München 2025, Karlovi Vari 2025
This family drama, centred on a renowned filmmaker attempting to reconnect with his daughter, a talented theatre actress, is imbued with Joachim Trier's signature Scandinavian charm.
Nora is an aspiring stage actress with a glittering career ahead of her. Her estranged father, the once-renowned director Gustav Borg, offers her a role in what he hopes will be his comeback, a film based on his own life. Still harbouring resentment over his years of absence, Nora turns down his offer. She soon discovers that Gustav has given her part to an eager young Hollywood star, Rachel Kemp, whose intrusion on Nora's family home triggers more panic. Suddenly, Nora and her sister must navigate their complicated relationship with their father, and deal with an American star dropped right into the middle of their complex family dynamics.
My grandfather, Erik Lochen, was a director. His film Jakten, was in competition in Cannes in 1959. In my family there was this discussion with my parents and a little bit I remember, as a child, about "what is uniquely cinematic". One of the things my grandfather said was "Tati". He said "You cannot do that in a theatre, you cannot do that in a book, it's not a song: it's cinema". And it's what I'm yearning for. It's to try to find something very personal that keeps going around my head and I try to find a form that I hope is cinematic.
Joachim Trier
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Sentimental Value (Affeksjonsverdi)
20 Feb
19:00
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7,00 EUR
6,20 EUR * * EUR for younger than 25 and older than 65, as well as pensioners.
Written by: Josh Safdie, Ronald Bronstein
Director of Photography: Darius Khondji
Music: Daniel Lopatin
Cast: Timothée Chalamet (Marty Mauser), Gwyneth Paltrow (Kay Stone), Odessa A'zion (Rachel Mizler), Larry 'Ratso' Sloman (Murray Norkin), Abel Ferrara (Ezra Mishkin), Sandra Bernhard (Judy), Emory Cohen (Ira Mizler), Géza Röhrig (Béla Kletzki)
Distribution: Blitz
After Uncut Gems (2019), the Safdie brothers decided to pursue solo careers. Unlike his younger brother Benny, Josh Safdie persists in using the brothers’ signature iconography, full of manic New York losers, morally questionable manipulators, and deluded characters dreaming of a big break, fame, and money. One such protagonist is the charismatic Marty Mauser, a small-time know-it-all who ekes out a hand-to-mouth existence, rejects commitment (both to jobs and relationships) and dreams of a career as a professional table tennis player (a sport that’s becoming a "big thing" in the early 1950s Asia), while still looking for his first influential US backer. In sticking to his grand plan, Marty breaks promises, runs up debts, makes shady acquaintances, and dodges stable romantic relationships. He stakes everything on the upcoming world championship in Tokyo, seeking to challenge the unbeatable local champion Endo. The film is loosely based on real-life table tennis player, Marty Reisman.
I started playing table tennis as a kid, following in the footsteps of generations of my family. I learned about legendary eccentric Jewish immigrant Lower East Side characters who’d play at my grandparents’ kitchen table after Shabbat dinner. It opened my eyes to this fascinating subculture of misfits who all congregated in New York and played for money all the time. You have this thing that’s so meaningful to you and means nothing to other people. Then my wife picked up a copy of The Money Player, the memoir by ‘50s table-tennis champion Marty Reisman, at a thrift store, and she figured I would be into it.
Josh Safdie
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Marty Supreme
1 Jan
18:00
4 Jan
17:00
7 Jan
17:00
10 Jan
20:00
20 Jan
19:00
30 Jan
19:00
4 Feb
19:00
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6,50 EUR
5,50 EUR * * EUR for younger than 25 and older than 65, as well as pensioners.
24 Jan 20:00
Peacock (Pfau - Bin ich echt?)
Directed by: Bernhard Wenger
Austria, Germany, 2024, 102'
Screenplay: Bernhard Wenger
Cinematography: Albin Wildner
Cast: Albrecht Schuch (Matthias), Julia Franz Richter (Sophia), Anton Noori (David), Theresa Frostad Eggesbo (Ina), Branko Samarovski (Johann), Maria Hofstätter (Vera), Salka Weber (Nora)
Producer: Nikolaus Geyrhalter Filmproduktion
Distribution: Demiurg
Focusing on a master impersonator for hire slipping seamlessly into any role demanded by his clients, Wenger's directorial debut feature abounds in visual humour and unexpected plot twists.
Working for a rent-a-companion agency, Matthias is a master of his profession. Do you need a 'cultured boyfriend' to impress your friends? A 'perfect son' to influence your business partners' opinion of you? Or maybe just a sparring partner to rehearse an argument? Whatever it is, just rent Matthias. While excelling at pretending to be someone else, just being himself is the real challenge. Matthias' people-pleasing attitude has become so extreme that his girlfriend Sophia begins to wonder if he's not actually role-playing himself as well. "You're not real anymore," she tells Matthias before she leaves him.
Back in 2014, I came across "rent a friend" agencies, which have existed in Japan for two decades. You can rent friends, family members - anything you don't have in your life. I flew to Japan and met their employees. I not only learnt a lot about the background of these agencies and how the employees prepare, but I also met a person who told me that because of this peculiar profession, she no longer really knows who she is. I adopted this conflict for the main character and built the story around it."
Bernhard Wenger
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Peacock (Pfau - Bin ich echt?)
9 Jan
20:00
18 Jan
17:00
24 Jan
20:00
29 Jan
17:00
3 Feb
19:00
27 Feb
19:00
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6,50 EUR
5,50 EUR * * EUR za mlajše od 25 in starejše od 65 let ter upokojence.
Screenplay: Paolo Sorrentino
Cinematography: Daria D'Antonio
Music: Nick Donnelly
Cast: Toni Servillo (Mariano de Santis), Anna Ferzetti (Dorotea De Santis), Orlando Cinque (Colonnello Labaro), Massimo Venturiello (Ugo Romani), Milvia Marigliano (Coco Valori), Giuseppe Gaiani (Lanfranco Mare), Giovanna Guida (Valeria Cafiero), Alessia Giuliani (Maria Gallo), Roberto Zibetti (Domenico Samaritano), Linda Messerklinger (Isa Rocca), Vasco Mirandola (Cristiano Arpa)
Producer: The Apartment & Numero10 & PiperFilm
Distribution: Fivia
Director Paolo Sorrentino reunites with actor Toni Servillo in this tale of hard decisions. Best Actor Award at Venice 2025.
Mariano De Santis is the President of the Italian Republic. A widower and a Catholic, he has a daughter, Dorotea, a legal scholar like himself. As his term draws to a close, amid uneventful days, two final duties arise: deciding on two delicate petitions for a presidential pardon. True moral dilemmas, which become tangled with his private life, in ways that seem impossible to unravel. Driven by doubt, he will have to decide. And, with a deep sense of responsibility, that is exactly what this remarkable Italian President will do.
As a young man I was profoundly struck by Kieślowski's Decalogue. A masterpiece entirely focused on moral dilemmas; the plot of all plots, the only truly compelling narrative. More than any thriller. I don't believe I have even remotely approached the genius of Kieślowski, nor the depth with which he tackled moral themes, but I felt compelled to try anyway, in a historical moment when ethics sometimes seems optional, elusive, opaque, or all too often invoked only for instrumental reasons. Ethics is a serious matter. It holds up the world. And Mariano De Santis is a serious man.
Paolo Sorrentino
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Grace (La Grazia)
3 Jan
19:00
8 Jan
17:00
13 Jan
19:00
17 Jan
20:00
23 Jan
20:00
5 Feb
19:00
21 Feb
17:30
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6,50 EUR
5,50 EUR * * EUR for younger than 25 and older than 65, as well as pensioners.
Founder and main co-funder of Cankarjev dom’s Arts and Culture programme
