Dealing with the Past
True Stories Market
TIME
Wednesday, August 17th, 2022.
14:30 – 15:30 (CET)
LOCATION
Hotel Europe Atrium
The True Stories Market is dedicated to improving dialogue among the countries of former Yugoslavia, which are faced with deep and far-reaching consequences of the aftermath of past conflicts. The market presents four cases selected from the archives of key organisations that work to document the Yugoslav Wars to film and TV professionals. This serves as an open source for filmmakers to weave stories that can address larger audiences, with all the urgency and power that cinema has to offer. After the festival, in order to facilitate the transition of these stories from market to screen, an open call invites filmmakers to apply to execute a project inspired by one of the cases highlighted by the market.
Moderated by:
Robert Zuber, Film Director / Croatia
DEPTHS OF VELEBIT
FILIP ŠKILJAN (42) and MILAN RADANOVIĆ (45) are historians from Zagreb. The remains of the Ustasha death camp are hidden in the hills of Velebit. Filip and Milan are trying to find these remains, once and for all, while IVO GOLDSTEIN (64) reads a letter that arrived to the recipient (his father) 64 years later.
The film DEPTHS OF VELEBIT deals with the fate of the victims of fascism and the continuous culture of forgetting and erasure from the collective memory of everything that was once a place of union, that is, anti-fascism, which, at its core value, aimed to unite differences. Today these differences present the basis for new killing grounds.
Mladen Ivanović
THE STORY OF DŽENITA MULABDIĆ
THE STORY OF DŽENITA MULABDIĆ is the story of 30 years of impunity for the crimes of paramilitary units in Bijeljina. MULABDIĆ watched, with her own eyes, the brutal crimes of the Serbian Volunteer Guard, called Akranovci, in Bijeljina. Those crimes marked the beginning of the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina in which 100,000 people were killed. Her husband was killed before her eyes, and she also saw some of the other murders. Today, the street where she watched those crimes is named Street of Serbian Voluntary Guard. She testified about her experiences to investigators, but no one was ever convicted of her husband's murder. "It hurts me that no one ever answered for this crime", is her message.
BIRN BiH
THE STORY OF EŠEF DŽANANOVIĆ
EŠEF DŽANANOVIĆ survived concentration camps Keraterm, Trnopolje and Omarska, witnessing countless murders and beatings. In the camp, he learned that his family had been killed. He lost five family members, sons Alen and Ajdin aged four and nine, a sister aged 17, his wife aged 32 and his mother. Today, he is fighting for the truth and for building a monument to the murdered children. The authorities of the city of Prijedor are preventing him from doing this. "I am most sorry that my neighbours all the way to Prijedor know about my family, my sons, they all know who killed them, where they are hidden, but unfortunately I did not find the remains", is his message.
BIRN BiH
A HERO FROM THE ARENA
For those whose loved ones were killed or disappeared during the Second World War in Yugoslavia, war wounds did not stop in 1945. In that less visible war after the war, in the struggle to find the missing and reunite families Marino Zurli, a discreet hero of great deeds, also participated. This Croatian writer and journalist of Arena has been publishing stories and photos about the missing for ten years, putting together separated families, finding lost people and restoring joy to the hearts of those who believed that their loved ones will never appear again. In his lifetime, Marino Zurli managed to connect 150 families. This is a story about him.
Next Game
ROBERT ZUBER, born in 1976 in Pula. For 18 years, he has worked across all segments of media in Croatia and was twice awarded by the Croatian Journalists’ Association. After gaining necessary professional experience as a journalist and editor while working, among others, for BBC, Radio 101 and Nova TV, he started working for the Croatian public broadcaster, HRT, where he spent 11 years investigating various social and humanitarian issues, mostly through his TV show THE MISSION. He started making documentaries in 2001, when he completed his first documentary film, NA STANICI U PULI, which became the most successful theatrically released documentary in Croatia that year. His second autobiographical documentary, AN ACCIDENTAL SON, filmed within the UNICEF ‘Every Child Needs a Home’ project, received the Oktavijan award for the best documentary at the Croatian Film Days festival. His next documentary, MILA SEEKS SENIDA, won the human rights award of the Sarajevo Film Festival. In 2017, he directed MILLION DOLLAR LIFE which won the “Golden Studio” media award for the best Croatian documentary. After spending three years at the helm of HRT’s Documentary Production Department, in 2016 he quit his job with the public broadcaster to establish his own production company ToroLab. ToroLab produces content for digital platforms, as well as documentary films and series. He also works as an associated professor at the Vern University in Zagreb.