Sarajevo Film Festival Winners: ‘Blackbird Blackbird Blackberry’ Takes Top Honors

Ava DuVernay’s past experiences with the Venice Film Festival have been more exclusionary than esteemed, revealed the director during a press conference for her new film “Origin” on Wednesday.

Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore‘s new movie May December is set to introduce the 2023 New York Film Festival later this month!

With no film industry to speak of, and limited funds to make a movie in one of the most remote places on earth, young Bhutanese director/writer Pawo Choyning Dorji pulled off a miracle with his first feature, Lunana: A Yak In The Classroom which came out of nowhere to get an Oscar nomination for Best International Feature (formerly Best Foreign Language Film) in 2019. It was a charmer of a movie set in a village in Bhutan with no connection to the outside world and where a young teacher must decide whether he wants to stay and teach the kids or follow his dreams to Australia.

In principle, using the rainy-day, kitchen-sink post-rock of Manchester band The Smiths so prominently in a film like The Killer seems incredibly perverse, given that it’s an exotic, globe-trotting thriller about an American assassin. But in reality, it’s actually very sound choice indeed: legend has it that the band’s singer, Morrissey, had two reasons for naming his band so, the first being that “Smith” is one of the most common and thus unremarkable surnames in the world. The second, and much more subversive theory, suggests that it’s also a reference to David and Maureen Smith, brother-in-law and sister of ’60s serial killer Myra Hindley, the snappily dressed couple whose testimony blew open the Moors Murderers case and whose beatnik likenesses adorn the cover of Sonic Youth’s 1990 album “Goo”.

Five years after his triumphant A Star is Born world premiered at the Venice Film Festival, Bradley Cooper is back on the Lido with Maestro. Except, the director and star is only here in spirit owing to the SAG-AFTRA strike.

Dynamic Greek filmmaker Yorgos Lanthimos’ anticipated latest, Poor Things, got a rapturous reception at after it world premiere at the Venice Film Festival on Friday, with a standing ovation timed at 10 minutes and 37 seconds.

The Venice Film Festival began August 30 with opening-night movie , an Italian World War II drama, kicking off a lineup for the venerable fest’s 80th edition that includes world premieres of Michael Mann’s Ferrari, Bradley Cooper’s Maestro, Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla, Yorgos Lanthimos’ Poor Things, David Fincher’s The Killer, Ava DuVernay’s Origins, and new films from lightning-rod directors Roman Polanski, Woody Allen and Luc Besson.

Naman Ramachandran The 67th BFI London Film Festival has unveiled the titles that will compete in its official, first feature, documentary and short film competitions. Festival director Kristy Matheson said: “The films represented in each of these competitive strands offer audiences an exciting array of U.K. and global filmmaking voices and cinematic forms.

EXCLUSIVE: There has been mystery for weeks over which Hollywood talent will attend the Venice Film Festival amid the two strikes but the clouds are finally starting to lift.

Chris Hemsworth is taking over another spot on Netflix’s most popular films list.

The World War Two drama War Sailor — which debuted at last year’s Toronto Film Festival — swept Norway’s Amanda Awards last night, taking four main awards.

Guy Lodge Film Critic On the final weekend of a bustling 18-day event, the in-person edition of this year’s Melbourne Film Festival has drawn to a close with an awards ceremony that saw a whopping $300,000 AUD (over $191,000 USD) in prize money handed out across six categories. The biggest individual award of $140,000 AUD (nearly $90,000 USD) was presented to the winner of the fest’s international Bright Horizons competition: “Banel & Adama,” an arresting debut feature by Franco-Senegalese filmmaker Ramata-Toulaye Sy.

Blackbird Blackbird Blackberry” won the top prize, the Heart of Sarajevo Award for best feature film, Friday at the Sarajevo Film Festival. The Georgian film, in which a stoically independent woman in her late 40s experiences a gentle existential awakening during an affair with a local deliveryman, also won the best actress prize for Ekaterine Chavleishvili’s performance.

EXCLUSIVE: As Barbie approaches the end of a spectacularly successful first month in theaters, the Israel Film Festival has set one of the film’s great champions, Mattel Chairman and CEO Ynon Kreiz, to receive its 2023 IFF Industry Leadership Award.

The Sarajevo Film Festival has distanced itself from a controversial Serbian film that has been accused of glorifying Serbian nationalist groups after experts from the feature were screened at the festival’s industry forum.

Christopher Vourlias A World War II drama that critics say glorifies Serbian nationalist groups has sparked outrage at the Sarajevo Film Festival, with organizers under fire for allowing excerpts of the forthcoming film to screen and the mayor of Sarajevo demanding resignations in the ensuing dust-up. On Wednesday, the Sarajevo fest fought back, insisting that it was caught off-guard by the film’s inclusion at an industry event on Tuesday.

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor The Sarajevo Film Festival has modified its scheduled activities on Wednesday after the Bosnia and Herzegovina government declared it to be a “Day of Mourning” following three murders committed in Gradačac on Friday. The perpetrator, a bodybuilder, reportedly livestreamed the murder of his first victim, his former wife, on Instagram.

The Sarajevo Film Festival has canceled all social events and will halt red-carpet coverage set for tomorrow (Aug 16) to observe Bosnia’s national day of mourning following a high-profile triple murder-suicide in the country’s Northeastern region.

Bono surprised attendees at the Sarajevo Film Festival in Bosnia with an a cappella rendition of Bob Marley‘s ‘Redemption Song’ – watch the moment below.The frontman and The Edge were present at the film festival for a special screening of U2‘s Kiss The Future documentary when the legendary Irish vocalist hopped on the mic to serenade the crowd.Fans quickly joined in to sing along to the track after Bono unexpected belted out the opening lines to the Bob Marley classic. Watch a clip of the performance below.#Bono & #TheEdge at the #SarajevoFilmFestival for #KissTheFuture: "Redemption Song"Video © @28th_sff"When Bono's voice meets the silver screen.

Iranian filmmaker Ali Ahmadzadeh clinched the Golden Leopard in the main international competition of the 76th Locarno Film Festival with his latest feature Critical Zone (Mantagheye Bohrani).