Director: Marcel Schüpbach, Switzerland 2006, 95 min., French and English subtitles
Filmmaker Marcel Schüpbach was given unprecedented access behind the scenes of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague. In an atmosphere of high tension, where everything plays out like a poker game, prosecutor Carla Del Ponte and her team relentlessly pursue notorious perpetrators of crimes against humanity, such as Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic, still at large. Both Serbia and Croatia —as well as the International Community—pledge total cooperation in helping locate the suspects, but this does not seem to produce any concrete results.
Director: Zelimir Zilnik, Serbia 2004, 61 min.
The final preparations for the big change in Serbian neighbourhood are on the way: in spring of 2004. Hungary will became a member of EU, Slovenia as well (being the first one among former Yugoslav republics). Border crossings on the Serbian north - Horgos, Djala and Kelebia - will become the gates of united Europe, likewise all the border crossing between Slovenia and Croatia.
Director: Zelimir Zilnik, Slovenia 2001, 80 min.
People of different nationalities from Central Europe attempting to reach the West by crossing the controls and "European" rules. Starting from reality, the director reconstructed some stories and chose the cast both among people who experienced them and fledgling actors. They reconstruct these stories, and perhaps fake them, through the answers they give to the (Hungarian, Slovenian, Italian and Croatian) custom officers and to the author's questions.
Director: Rie Rasmussen, France 2008, 110 min.
Adria is half Serbian and half Albanian and is now living in France as an illegal immigrant – an existence that turns out to be no less precarious. During the course of the film Adria finds herself confronted with horrific atrocities. The young woman has to stand the test of many unarmed conflicts; but there also tender, loving moments in a life that only has the appearance of being without bars. This is a world in which Belgrade’s bombs and Europe’s underworld play just as much of a role as spontaneous desire, which might give rise to genuine love. A ‘product of the imaginary borders of now meaningless states’, Adria is searching for spiritual equilibrium. She is also trying to discover her identity as a woman and a human being. At the same time she is being held prisoner and trained in a violent, predominantly male-run zoo. It’s not her game – but she’s learning fast.
Director: 2007, 20 min., Serbian and Romani with Serbian subtitle
Roma children are collecting and selling various waste in order to help their parents support the family. The main character in the film is eleven year-old Roma boy who, besides working with his parents, manages to attend school and boxing training.
Director: Goran Paskaljevic, Serbia and Montenegro 2004, 95 min., Serbo-Croatian with English subtitles
In 2004, Paskaljevic has crafted what may be the defining film on postwar Serbia and the quiet tragedy that is unfolding in this psychologically devastated country. Set in the winter of 2004, Lazar, a Serbian Army deserter sent to prison for many years, returns to his home in hopes of returning to his former, normal life.
Director: Mark Landsman, Kosovo 2000, 15 min., Albanian with English subtitles
In the summer of 2000, just over one year after Serbian withdrawal from Kosovo, a group of Albanian teenagers from the Kosovarian city of Peje came together to create a video postcard of their experiences during and after the war.
2007, 40 min., Serbian
Documentary featuring interviews with Roma survivors from Nazi concentration camps and their remembrances of the destiny of Roma during Nazi occupation of Serbia.
Director: Goran Paskaljevic, France/Yugoslavia/Greece/Turkey1998, 102 min., Serbo-Croatian with English Subtitles
FIPRESCI International Critic's prize at the 1998 Venice Film Festival
Goran Paskaljevic’s Balkan Caberet (The Powder Keg), which played to sold out audiences at the 2000 HRWIFF London, is a seminal film on the tragedy and social self-implosion of Serbian society in the 1990’s.
Set on the eve of the 1995 Dayton Peace Accord, "The Powder Keg" presents a cast of finely drawn characters moving through the darkened streets in Belgrade in a series of strange and intertwining events. The film ricochets from black comedy to heightened realism, reminiscent in style to Quentin Tarantino's "Pulp Fiction.
Directors: Katarina Rejger/ Eric van den Broek, Bosnia and Herzegovina/Slovenia/Macedonia/Croatia/Serbia and Montenegro (including Kosovo) 2004/2005, 75 min., Albanian, Macedonian, Serbian and Slovenian with English subtitles
Videoletters is a truly groundbreaking and emotionally uplifting series of twenty short documentary films. In each episode, two people of different nationalities send each other a video letter, explaining how this could have happened. In each case, they were friends, neighbors, or colleagues before the war drove them apart.
Human Rights Conventions Overview
Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, 1948
Convention relating to the Status of Refugees, 1951
Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings, 2005
Convention for the Protection of National Minorities, 1994
European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, 1950
Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities, 1995
Human Rights Documents on Refugees and Migrants, 2010
International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, 1965