NOTABLE GUESTS AND PARTICIPANTS
Film Directors:
Jasmila Žbanić, Pjer Žalica, Igor Drljača, Aida Begić, Bojan Bodružić, Mirjana Karanović, Ademir Kenović, Alen Drljević, Elmir Jukić, Nebojša Slijepčević, Goran Kapetanović, Kirsten Johnson, Danis Tanović, Ena Sendijarević, Ines Tanović, Aleksandra Odić, Benjamin Filipović, Una Gunjak, Damir Avdagić, Timur Makarević, Claire Wasserman, Elma Tataragić, Chris Leslie, Davor Mamuzić, Džemal Šabić, Gates Gooding, Geoffrey Alan Rhodes, Igor Borovac, Joseph Pierson, Namik Kabil, Pamela Hogan, Refik Hodžić, Rešad Kulenović, Sabina Vajrača, and Samir Bajrić among others.
Actors:
Izudin Bajrović, Mirjana Karanović, Emir Hadžihafizbegović, Armand Assante, Daniela Dakich, Jelena Stupljanin, Kasia Grabowski, Snežana Bogdanović, Uliks Fehmiu.
Other prominent guests:
Producer Alem Babić; writers Alexandar Hemon and Zlata Filipović; Sarajevo Film Festival representatives Elma Tataragić, Emina Ganić and Mirsad Purivatra; artists Nebojša Seric Shoba, Aida ŠehoviĆ; designer Mirko Ilić; BH Ambassador to the US Jadranka Negodić, journalist and writer, Aida Čerkez.
TESTIMONIALS
Angelina Jolie
director of the film “In the Land of Blood and Honey” which screened at the BHFF in 2012
Thank you Bosnian-Herzegovinian Film Festival for supporting our film, “In the Land of Blood and Honey”. It’s an honor to be included in this incredible celebration of Balkan film and art. [...] “In the Land of Blood and Honey” is not just an exploration of the toll war takes on people – it is also a celebration of the tremendous talent in the region. When I first visited Bosnia I fell in love with the country, the people, and the culture. I made this film in part to focus the world’s attention on the region's art, music, and vibrancy. I was touched by the warmth and hospitality of the Bosnians I met and had the privilege of working with, and their courage and optimism inspired me. [... ]
Arsen Ostojić
director of ‘Halima’s Path’ which screened at the BHFF in 2013
BHFF is a festival that may be small in size but is certainly large in spirit. The most beautiful aspect of all of this is when a film is shown before a full theater, before a public consisting of people from our parts of the world, as well as Americans. It is absolutely beautiful to see how they all react in the same manner, recognizing true human emotion as well as the story's persuasiveness.
Jadranka Negodić
Former Ambassador of Bosnia-Herzegovina to the U.S.
The BHFF has grown to become a traditional fixture of New York City’s cultural scene and is a highly anticipated event among both Bosnian and even larger American and other ethnic audiences in the city. The BHFF not only brings together Bosnians but other Balkan communities, and opens opportunities for interaction, better understanding, and cooperation.
Nedžad Begović
director of the film “A Cell Phone Movie” which screened at BHFF in 2012 and the film “Totally Personal” which screened at BHFF in 2005
It is wonderful that far away in New York we have our own artistic exposition through the work of Bosnian enthusiasts who enable the exposure of our films.
SPECIAL GUESTS AND PANELISTS
Mirjana Karanović
director of the film ‘A Good Wife’ which screened at the BHFF in 2016
Mirjana Karanović is a Serbian actress known for important roles in many former Yugoslav films. She made her screen debut in 1980 and achieved international fame with the role of Senija in "When Father Was Away on Business" (1985 Cannes Film Festival Golden Palm winner and Academy Award nominee for Best Foreign Language Film). For her performance as Esma in "Grbavica" (2006 Golden Bear Award for Best Film at the Berlinale), Karanović won awards at multiple festivals and a nomination for the European Film Academy Award 2006. In 2008 she won the Winning Freedom Award, presented to a woman whose work promotes and affirms the principles of human rights, rule of law, democracy and tolerance in society.
Kirsten Johnson
director of the film “Cameraperson” which screened at BHFF in 2016
Kirsten Johnson has worked as both a documentary cinematographer and director, committing herself to human rights issues and visual creativity. She is the principal cinematographer on over 40 feature-length documentaries and has been credited with countless others. She shot many highly-acclaimed and award-winning documentaries including "Pray the Devil Back to Hell", "Fahrenheit 9/11", "This Film is Not Yet Rated", and "The Invisible War". Johnson has a longstanding collaboration with Oscar-winning filmmaker Laura Poitras, credited as cinematographer on her films "The Oath", "Citizenfour", and the upcoming "Asylum".
Ademir Kenović
producer "The Frog"
Ademir Kenović is an award-winning Bosnian producer and film director. He graduated from the University of Sarajevo in English literature in 1969 and then studied film and art at Denison University in Ohio. In 1989 he was appointed Professor at the Academy of Performing Arts in Sarajevo, Department of Directing and film Production. As one of the founding partners of the film production company Refresh, he has been producing films since the early ‘90’s. During the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, he directed and produced numerous war documentaries including BAFTA awarded Sarajevo: A Street Under Siege. Mr. Kenović's directed films including Kuduz and Little Bit of Soul are today widely considered classics of pre-war Bosnian and Yugoslavian cinematography.
Aida Begić
director "Never Leave Me"
Aida Begic was born in Sarajevo in 1976. She graduated directing at the Sarajevo Academy of Performing Arts. Her graduation film "First Death Experience" was presented at The Cinefondation Official Selection of the 2001 Cannes Film Festival and won numerous awards at festivals worldwide. In 2003 she wrote and directed her second short film "North Went Mad". Her debut feature “Snow” won the Grand Prix at the Semaine de la Critique and was nominated for a European Academy Film Award. “Children of Sarajevo” won a Special Distinction at Un Certain Regard. In 2014, she wrote and directed “Album”, part of the omnibus “Bridges of Sarajevo”, which world premiered at the Official Selection of the Cannes IFF.
Emir Hadžihafisbegović
actor "Men Don't Cry" "The Frog"
Emir Hadžihafizbegović is a lead actor in two films presented at BHFF this last and he is a prolific and renowned actor with a long list of award-winning films on his resume. Emir has appeared and been in more than 80 roles in theater and on TV spanning a 30-year career. Mr. Hadžihafizbegović was born in the Bosnian city of Tuzla in 1961. He received his diploma in acting at the Academy of Arts in Sarajevo in 1986. He was awarded the Golden Arena for best actor at the Pula Film Festival and Best Actor Award at the Durban International Film Festival. Hadžihafizbegović was also the Minister of Culture and Sport in Sarajevo Canton.
Alen Drljević
director "Men Don't Cry"
Alen Drljević was born in Sarajevo, Bosnia, and Herzegovina. He graduated from the Academy of Performing Arts in Sarajevo in 2005. His diploma work, the short fiction film "Paycheck" was nominated for a European Film Academy Award. His documentary feature debut "Carnival" was selected by IDFA 2006, in its “First Appearance” and “Movies that Matter” competitions. His fiction feature debut film "Men Don't Cry" premiered at Karlovy Vary IFF 2017. He is a member of the European Film Academy.
Ron Haviv
photojournalist
An Emmy-nominated, award-winning photojournalist, Ron Haviv is co-founder of agency VII, dedicated to documenting conflict and raising awareness about human rights issues around the globe. In the last three decades, Haviv has covered more than 25 conflicts and worked in over 100 countries. He has published four critically acclaimed collections of photography, and his work has been featured in numerous museums and galleries internationally, including the Louvre, the United Nations, and the Council on Foreign Relations.
Haviv has produced an unflinching record of the injustices of war and his photography has had a singular impact. His work in the Balkans, which spanned over a decade, was used as evidence to indict and convict war criminals at the international tribunal at The Hague.
Danis Tanović
director of film "Death in Sarajevo" which screened at BHFF in 2016
Danis Tanović is a Bosnian film director, producer, and screenwriter. Tanović is best known for having directed and written the script for the 2001 Bosnian movie "No Man's Land" which won him the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. He is widely considered one of the best contemporary Bosnian filmmakers of his generation and has garnered critical acclaim for many of his movies. Danis Tanović was born in the central Bosnian city of Zenica and raised in Sarajevo. His film "Death in Sarajevo" won the Jury Grand Prix at the 66th Berlin International Film Festival,as well as the FIPRESCI prize. He currently works as a professor of film directing at the Academy of Performing Arts in Sarajevo.
Ana Janevski
performance art curator
Ana Janevski is currently an Associate Curator in the Department of Media and Performance Art at The Museum of Modern Art. Most recently, she co-organized the performance series Words in the World at MoMA. From 2007 to 2011, she held the position of Curator at the Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw, Poland, where she curated, among many other projects, the large-scale exhibition As Soon As I Open My Eyes I See a Film, on the topic of Yugoslav experimental film and art from the 1960s and 1970s. She also edited a book with the same title. In 2010 she co-curated the first extensive show about an experimental film in Yugoslavia, This Is All Film! Experimental Film in Yugoslavia 1951–1991, at the Museum of Modern Art in Ljubljana. Janevski also co-curated, with Pierre Bal-Blanc, the performance exhibition The Living Currency.
Aleksandar Bošković
lecturer
Aleksandar Bošković is a Lecturer in Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian in the Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures at Columbia University, where he teaches courses on the intersection of literature and visual culture in Slavic avant-gardes as well as on Yugoslav and post-Yugoslav cinema and literature. He has published essays on issues of digital mnemonics, Yugonostalgia and cultural memory, avant-garde photobooks, Serbian poetry and post-Yugoslav fiction, Küntstlerroman, and the theory of possible worlds. He is currently working on several projects, including the anthology of Yugoslav modernism and the book manuscript, Slavic Avant-Garde Cinepoetry, a cross-cultural and interdisciplinary exploration of photo poetry and bioscopic books within Slavic avant-gardes.
Aleksandra Odić
director "Great Wall of China"
Aleksandra Odić was born in Bosnia-Herzegovina and immigrated to Germany as a child in 1992 amid the Bosnian War. An accomplished actress, she has appeared in several television programs, including the crime series Soko: 5113, Soko: Kitzbühel, and Soko: Leipzig, as well as Vienna Crime Squad and Nachschicht, along with the short films Moonlight (2008) and Tango (2011). Aleksandra studied directing at the German Film and Television Academy in 2010 and received a fellowship two years later from the Department of Film and Media Art at the Academy of Arts in Berlin. Great Wall of China marks her directorial debut.
Elmir Jukić
director of the film "The Frog" which screened at the BHFF in 2018
Elmir Jukić is a Bosnian film director. He graduated from directing department at the Academy of Performing Arts in Sarajevo in 1993 and one of his most distinguished works is a popular Bosnian TV sitcom, Lud, zbunjen, normalan. He worked on films "Welcome to Sarajevo" and "The Hunting Party". Elmir is a Senior Assistant in film directing subject at the Academy of Dramatic Arts in Sarajevo. He was a member of the editorial board of the film magazine “Sineast”, and published more than 80 articles about a film in “Slobodna Bosna”, “Lica” and “Svijet”, With his films he participated in film festivals in Goteborg, Prague, Rotterdam, Pula, Paris, Barcelona, Florence, Toronto, St. Petersburg, Locarno and many others.
Goran Kapetanović
director of films “Refugee 532” and "My Aunt in Sarajevo" which screened at the BHFF in 2016
Goran Kapetanović is a Bosnian-born director currently residing in Sweden. He studied film direction at the Stockholm Academy of Dramatic Arts. His last four films have received awards at 23 international festivals, including the Toronto Short Film Festival (Best European Short Film), the Montreal Black Film Festival (Canada Best Foreign Drama), and the International Student Film Festival. His work has also been shown at the Tribeca Film Festival, and the short Kiruna-Kigali was shortlisted for the Oscars. From 2005–2010 Goran worked as a producer and mentor at workshops in Kigali, Rwanda, where he collaborated on five short films with members of the Rwanda Film Centre.