Sarajevo on film: Kusturica, Žbanić, Tanović and the festival

Kusturica’s Sarajevo

Emir Kusturica was born in Sarajevo in 1954, and his first two features are love letters to the city of his youth. Do You Remember Dolly Bell? (1981) won the Golden Lion for best first film in Venice, and When Father Was Away on Business (1985), a family story of the 1950s seen through a small boy’s eyes, won the Palme d’Or at Cannes.

Walter, The Battle of Neretva and the bridge at Jablanica

Hajrudin Krvavac’s Walter Defends Sarajevo (1972), became one of the best-loved foreign films ever shown in China, and made its star, Bata Živojinović, famous there. Veljko Bulajić’s The Battle of Neretva (1969) was made largely in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and its crew blew up the railway bridge at Jablanica for the climax. The fallen bridge still lies in the river beside the museum, on the road to Mostar.

Jablanica lake & the Neretva valley →

Tanović, Žbanić and the festival

Danis Tanović’s No Man’s Land won the Oscar for best foreign language film in 2002. Jasmila Žbanić won the Golden Bear with Grbavica (2006), named after a Sarajevo neighbourhood, and was nominated for the Oscar with Quo Vadis, Aida? (2020), for which Jasna Đuričić won the European Film Award for best actress.

Every August the Sarajevo Film Festival, founded in 1995, turns the city into the film capital of the region, with open-air screens across the old town.

Sarajevo Film Festival →   The festival’s open-air cinemas →   Kinoteka BiH →   Balkan Cinema: our long read on the ULTIMATE Regions guide →