Introducing the Dealing with the Past Programme of the 31st Sarajevo Film Festival

Dealing with the Past programme continues to create space for confronting traumas, untold stories, and forgotten perspectives that shape both collective and personal histories. The programme presents feature films, documentaries, and experimental works that delve into the aftermath of conflict and the politics of memory.

 

United States, 2025, 13 min.

Director: Christina Bartson

CAST: Sonia Desai Rayka

 

Adapted from a 1968 essay by the gay US socialist David E. McReynolds, the short archival film uses images and sounds of the American war in Vietnam to reflect on the feedback loop between militarism abroad and at home — and the people who resisted it.

 

Austria, 2024, 100 min.

Director: Magdalena Żelasko

 

In September 1943, seventeen-year-old Stanisław Zalewski was arrested in Warsaw as a member of a Polish resistance group and taken to the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp for labour service. From there, he was sent to Mauthausen and finally to the Gusen camp, where prisoners were forced to work for the German armaments industry under inhumane conditions.

 

Norway, Iceland, Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Belgium, 2025, 104 min.

Director: Tommy Gullliksen

 

As Putin’s war in Ukraine rages on, US president Biden persuades Jens Stoltenberg to remain for one more year as Secretary General of NATO. On a trip to Kyiv, he promises Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy that the alliance will stand by Ukraine “for as long as it takes." At this crucial time, support from the allied countries falters, leaving the prospect of peace in Ukraine and stability in Europe in question. Will Stoltenberg be able to keep his word to Zelenskyy?

 

Croatia, Slovenia, Italy, 2025, 112 min.

Director: Igor Bezinović

 

Citizens of Rijeka, Croatia, which Italians call Fiume, retell, reconstruct and reinterpret the bizarre story about the sixteen-month occupation of their city in 1919 by the Italian poet, dandy, and preacher of war Gabriele D’Annunzio.

 

Yugoslavia, 1969, 10 min.

Režija: Želimir Žilnik

 

JUNE TURMOIL documents student demonstrations that took place in Belgrade in June 1968. For the most part, the footage was shot in the courtyard of Kapetan Mišino Zdanje (the Faculty of Philosophy building), where students gathered and famous artists participated to show solidarity with the students.

 

Greece, 2025, 13 min.

Director: Yannis Karpouzis

 

Nefeli turns the camera on herself to say goodbye to a lost love. What begins as a personal farewell becomes a growing connection to collective resistance.

 

Norway, Latvia, Republic of Korea (South Korea), 2025, 93 min.

Director: Morten Traavik, Sun Kim

 

An old Korean proverb says the most beautiful women are in the North, and the most handsome men are in the South. What happens when you try to bring them together? Filmmakers Morten Traavik and Sun Kim journey across the Korean divide to follow Yujin Han, a sharp, charismatic entrepreneur who was born in North Korea and is the founder of LoveStorya, a matchmaking agency with a radical mission: pairing North Korean refugee women with South Korean men.

 

France, Palestine, Iran, 2025, 112 min.

Director: Sepideh Farsi

 

PUT YOUR SOUL ON YOUR HAND AND WALK is a filmmaker's response to the ongoing massacre of Palestinians. A miracle happened when director Sepideh Farsi met Fatima Hassona. Hassona became the filmmaker's eyes in Gaza, where she resisted while documenting the war, as Farsi became a link between Hassona and the world. The death of Fatima, on 16 April 2025, as a result of an Israeli raid on her home, changes its meaning forever.

 

Israel, Palestine, 2025, 15 min.

Director: Ayelet Bargur

 

TESTIMONIES OF PAIN AND HOPE is a powerful series of six short illustrated videos, each two or three minutes long, that share the deeply personal stories of bereaved Israelis and Palestinians who are members of the Parent Circle Families Forum who have lost loved ones in the war that began on 7 October 2023.

 

Germany, 2024, 93 min.

Director: Christoph Baumann

Cast: Sebastian Fischer, Anna Kaminski, Sandro Kirtzel, Lana-Mae Lopičić, Nora C. Pichler, Tom Kress

 

Tyrol, 1945: the last days of World War II. Anton, a severely wounded deserter from the SS, and Hannah, a Jewish woman, meet in a remote hut in the mountains. They are initially distrustful of each other, then feelings develop between them. A story about war and guilt, as well as compassion and humanity.

 

Germany, Bosnia and Herzegovina, 2024, 66 min.

Director: Mladen Miljanović

 

Four delegated performances and castings feature participants who are directly or indirectly actors of war: veterans, civilian victims, disabled individuals, or those traumatised by conflict. The project, aptly titled THE FINAL BATTLE, unfolds both in actuality and in its eventual cinematic manifestation through a casting call for a trailer.

 

Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, 2025, 28 min.

Director: Aleksandar Reljić

 

Students in Serbia did not celebrate the New Year of 2025; instead, at midnight, they held a fifteen-minute tribute to the victims of the canopy collapse at the Novi Sad Railway Station on November 1, 2024.

Germany, Austria, 2025, 88 min.

Director: Chiara Sambuchi

 

In July 1995, the Army of the Republika Srpska captured Srebrenica and massacred more then 8,000 Muslim men. The Bosnian Serb Army troops destroyed every trace of Srebrenica's inhabitants: their diaries, photos, and letters. One VHS tape survived destruction. This unique document is shot for a single viewer: Alisa, the then nine-year-old daughter of Sejfo, an avid amateur filmmaker and resident of Srebrenica. Alisa returns to Srebrenica to trace the footsteps of her father.