VERA DREAMS OF THE SEA

Kaltrina Krasniqi 

ISSTRA CREATIVE FACTORY (Kosovo), DREAM FACTORY (Macedonia), PAPADHIMITRI FILM PRODUCTION (Albania), fiction

After the suicide of the renowned judge, Fatmir Gashi, his wife Vera finds herself negotiating the future of her daughter with the underworld.

VERA (64) is a sign language interpreter, married to FATMIR (65), a retired judge. They’ve been trying to sell their village house for years, their plan to provide a future for SARA (28), their daughter, a single mother to one. Once they finally have a buyer - a highway track is planned to pass through their property - Fatmir kills himself. After his death, AHMET (45), a cousin from the village, claims that, as tradition has it, Fatmir left the house to him as the only male heir, asking Vera to transfer the ownership to him. Suspecting a ploy, Vera turns to Basri, a family friend, who advises her to give up the house. But Vera turns Ahmet down, prompting a series of threats and an accident risking Sara’s life. Fearing about her daughter, she gives up the house, only to find that Ahmet, Basri and Fatmir, have been part of underworld schemes involving illegal property transfers for years. When nobody expects it, she seeks revenge.

Kaltrina Krasniqi.jpg

Kaltrina Krasniqi / IMDb

KALTRINA KRASNIQI is an award winning Kosovo based film director and researcher working in film, television and digital humanities since early 2000. She is a founding member of Kosovo Oral History Initiative – a digital archive where personal histories of individuals from various paths of life are recorded and published, and a co-founder of the popular Prishtina café-bookshop Dit’ e Nat’; a non formal setting for promotion of film, literature and music. She graduated in Film Directing in the University of Prishtina in 2004 and in 2011 completed her MA in Kosovo’s Institute for Journalism and Communication. In 2015 she continued her professional development in the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) with focus in Film Producing. Her last film SARABANDE (2018) premiered in ZagrebDox, was awarded as Best Documentary in Cinalfama Film Festival and was a nominee in short documentary competition at Camerimage Festival 2018. Her first feature VERA DREAMS OF THE SEA is currently in postproduction.

Director’s statement

Vera, my mom, was in her 30s when she divorced my father. She fought a legal system highly influenced by tradition which bars women from property rights. In 2014 writer Doruntina Basha introduced me to VERA DREAMS OF THE SEA. I was immediately drawn to the story. Her VERA was similar to my mom. Submissive by nature, she speaks for the deaf. But her husband’s suicide throws her into a realm where his reputation is used to rob her daughter’s future. Vera unveils present day Kosovo: a merciless postwar megaproject of corruption disguised as modernization and economic progress, where women are collateral damage to yet another highway in making. I am Vera’s intimate observer: her aged body pushed to react sets the pace and tone of the film. She moves me - the life of women of her generation is rarely depicted in film. As Zadie Smith puts it - The first generation does what the second one doesn’t want to do so the third is free to do what it likes.

Where are we at?

Total Budget: 430.000,00 EUR

Financing in place: 330.000 ,00 EUR

Sales agent: none

Territories available: World

Looking for at CineLink?

CineLink Work in Progress is a great opportunity for us to eventually get funds or services to finish our Film Post (Audio and Picture Post). Moreover, being part of this program would boost the visibility of our project, and create a unique opportunity for cooperation for postproduction, which is what our film needs at this stage. We have worked hard for the past five years, overcoming many obstacles, to be able to tell a provoking story in an unconventional manner. We strongly believe that CineLink Work in Progress would complete our journey by helping us shape the final touches for a finish which we desire and which we believe our project deserves.

Production Company profile

ISSTRA CREATIVE FACTORY is a film and television production company from Kosovo, established in 2006 by SHKUMBIN ISTREFI, a well known actor and producer. The company’s mission is to promote Kosovo’s stories and brave storytellers with the aim of advancing Kosovo film.

isstra@gmail.com

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