The seventh AJB DOC Film Festival begins tonight: Featuring cutting-edge documentaries and an extensive accompanying program
The seventh edition of the Al Jazeera Balkans International Documentary Film Festival (AJB DOC) will open tonight with an official ceremony at the Bosnian Cultural Center (BKC) in Sarajevo.
The seventh edition of the Al Jazeera Balkans International Documentary Film Festival (AJB DOC) will open tonight with an official ceremony at the Bosnian Cultural Center (BKC) in Sarajevo at 7:30 p.m. Following the opening ceremony, the audience will attend a screening of the film Where the Olives Weep directed by Zaya and Maurizio Benazzo.
It is a heartbreaking, touching, and poignant documentary about the struggles and resilience of Palestinians living under Israeli occupation in the West Bank.
During the upcoming festival days, the audience will have the chance to watch 23 high-quality documentaries. These films share stories about the injustices experienced by Palestinians in Gaza and the occupied West Bank, as well as other pressing social issues.
The Festival will present five programme sections: Competition, AJB Screening, Last Minute Cinema, SmartDoc and Special Screening. The theme of injustice and the search for justice is prominent in all the films, so the Festival's theme, "JUSTICE?" was self-imposed, according to the Director of the AJB DOC Film Festival, Edhem Fočo.
Screenings of the films selected for the Seventh AJB DOC will take place at the Bosnian Cultural Center (BKC) and Cineplexx Sarajevo. Detailed information with the screening schedule and film synopses are available on the Festival's official website.
The international five-member jury will choose the best film from the Competition Programme. The jury members are Deborah London-Harrington,
a documentary filmmaker and Head of Production Management at Dogwoof; Namik Kabil, a film director and writer; Mila Turajlić, a documentary filmmaker; Francesco Montagner, a documentary filmmaker; and Myriam Francois, a journalist and documentary filmmaker.
AJD Industry Days and additional Festival programs
From September 14th to 16th, the 3rd AJD Industry Days will be held under the auspices of the AJB DOC Film Festival. It's a series of meetings for professionals in the documentary industry, aimed at connecting decision-makers with promising documentary projects.
With over 270 projects from nearly 50 countries submitted, 29 will be eligible for presentation in four categories: Main Pitch, Rough Cut, Balkan Stars and Special Selection. The evaluation of the projects is based on their topic, relevance, originality, storytelling quality, production skills, and potential for international impact.
The winning projects will share a total prize fund of around 120,000 euros.
As in the past few years, a three-day "Smartphone Documentary Film Production" training session for young regional authors will start on September 10th and continue through to the 12th. The activity is organized in cooperation with the Al Jazeera Media Institute and supported by Samsung as a part of the "Women Lead the Way towards Peace and Security in Bosnia and Herzegovina" project. Faris Bajrić, a video journalist, and Jane Mota, the director of Beechtobeach Ltd. will lead the course.
In addition to that, a panel discussion on "Violence against women" is scheduled for September 16th at 11 a.m. at Europe House, with support of the "Women Lead the Way towards Peace and Security in Bosnia and Herzegovina" project and implemented with the support of the United Nations Secretary General’s Peacebuilding Fund (PBF) in partnership with the Ministry of Human Rights and Refugees of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The project is led by the UN Resident Coordinator in BiH and implemented jointly by UN Women, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA).
Another event planned for this year's edition of AJB Festival is the masterclass "Life between checkpoints", scheduled for September 14th at Cineplexx Sarajevo at 1 p.m., led by Emre Baştuğ, director of TRT Balkan, and Melida Mustafić, a producer at the digital channel TRT Balkan.
Partners of the seventh AJB DOC Film Festival, which will be held from September 13th to 17th, are BH Telecom, the Ministry of Culture and Sports of Sarajevo Canton and the Tourism Association of Canton Sarajevo, and amongst other supporters are: UniCredit Bank, Courtyard by Marriott Sarajevo, Violeta Company, Meggle Company and AS Holding Company.