Language, Memory and Identity
The BalCan CrossOver project brings the festival of culture of the Western Balkans to the Presence Cinema for the third time. Visitors can look forward to eight unique film screenings, two literary launches, discussions with filmmakers and a lot of quality contemporary music.
FRIDAY 20.11.
14:00 ACADEMIC PROGRAM
Talk and book launch of Prof. Christian Voss (HU Berlin)
The presentation gives an overview of literature, cinema, and TV in Southeastern Europe since 2000: When artists from the Former Yugoslavia try to cope with victim and perpetrator trauma, they take subversive positions and challenge the nationalist mainstream in their countries. Transnational artists, as commuters between Western Europe and the Balkans, authentically tell their migration stories and experiences of culture shock, successfully glocalizing topics like hybridity and belonging.
Language: English
15:30 ACADEMIC PROGRAM
Traduki
TRADUKI is a European literary network that connects the countries of Southeastern Europe with German-speaking countries and with one another through literature. It supports literary translation, cooperation between authors, translators and publishers, and exchange between literary communities across linguistic and national borders. Its aim is to make literature from different parts of Europe accessible to readers and to foster intercultural dialogue. The project will be presented by Radmila Radovanović and Barbara Anderlič, who will introduce its activities, opportunities for translation funding, and the importance of international cooperation in promoting contemporary literature.
Language: English
18:00 LITERATURE / GUEST
Book Launch: MARS | Guest: Writer Asja Bakić
Asja Bakić (born 1982 in Tuzla, Bosnia and Herzegovina) is a poet, prose writer, essayist and translator based in Zagreb. She was one of the founders of the feminist web portal Muf. Her poetry collection Može i kaktus, samo neka bode was nominated for the prestigious Kiklop Award for Best Debut. She was also selected as one of the artists featured in the New Voices of Europe project.
Her short story collection Mars was shortlisted for the Edo Budiša Award and has been translated into English, German and French. Drawing on a diverse range of genres, including science fiction, horror and fantasy, Bakić explores the problems of the contemporary world, where human physicality and nature come into conflict with technology, as well as with prejudice and superstition. Mars, a symbol of masculinity and war, serves as the overarching theme of the collection, which presents a rather bleak vision of humanity and its future against a backdrop of diverse and often conflicting situations.
As part of this event, we will celebrate the launch of the Czech translation of MARS, the second title in our samizdat series CROSSOVER, with the author in attendance.
Language: Bosnian (Interpretation into Czech will be provided via whispered interpreting, also known as chuchotage.)
20:00 FILM – CLASSICS
The Fall of Rock ’n’ Roll (Kako je propao rokenrol)
Comedy • Yugoslavia • 1989 • 106 min • Directed by: Goran Gajić, Zoran Pezo, Vladimir Slavica • Serbian • Czech / English subtitles
Starring: Srđan Todorović, Sonja Savić, Velimir Bata Živojinović, Anica Dobra, Nebojša Bakočević, Vesna Trivalić, Branko Đurić, Bogdan Diklić, Dušan Kojić, Dragan Bjelogrlić, Slobodan Ninković and others
We won’t stop, we won’t hide, we still sing and burn inside! – sang Yugoslav rockers in 1989. And then rock’n’roll fell apart and commercial folk took center stage.
A three-part omnibus uses satire, absurdity, surreal situations and melodramatic elements to portray urban youth in Yugoslavia just before its fall. Three directors, three screenwriters and three composers follow characters facing eroding ideals, the commercialization of art and complex relationships. The diverse narratives are woven into a single portrait of an era by quirky antipodes: two bumbling cops and the r’n’r superhero Zeleni Zub.
The film holds a cult status both in the hearts of an entire generation and within official Yugoslav cinema, and its music – composed by iconic rock legends Dušan Kojić Koja (Disciplina Kičme), Vlada Divljan (Idoli) and Srđan Gojković Gile (Električni orgazam) – is the final soundtrack of the world they lived in, as it was drawing to an end.
IMDB
ČSFD
22:00 MUSIC
DJ Afterparty
A set featuring the best of the independent music scene of the Western Balkans is guaranteed to get you moving and broaden your musical horizons. The perfect event for anyone looking to experience the Balkans in all their diversity while having a great time.
Dejan Leković, Jakub Novosad and Marko Dinić will be spinning their favourite tracks.
SATURDAY 21.11.
11:30 ACADEMIC PROGRAM
Adriatic Sardines
Dr. Sara Žerić Đulović (IOS) in conversation with Dr. Tereza Juhászová (CU)
Drawing on documentary and archival footage, this presentation explores women's industrial labor in fish-canning factories along the socialist Adriatic coast. These factories depended heavily on women's manual labor, often classified as unskilled despite the considerable physical demands and practical knowledge involved in processing fish.
The presentation also examines the gendered division of labor between fishing at sea and processing fish on land, asking how women experienced and understood their relationship with the sea through industrial work. Finally, it reflects on how deindustrialization, the expansion of tourism, and changing marine environments have transformed the relationship between women's work, coastal communities, and the sea.
Language: English
14:00 FILM – CZECH PREMIERE
Talk to me, wind (Vetre, pričaj sa mnom)
Docudrama • Serbia / Croatia / Slovakia • 2025 • 100 min • Directed by: Stefan Đorđević • Serbian • Czech / English subtitles
Starring: Stefan Đorđević, Negrica Đorđević, Boško Đorđević and others
Just as our eyes do not see everything, our ears do not hear everything either. Or perhaps they do — but whether they truly understand is another question. Talk to me, wind is a warm and intimate story about different forms of love, about relationships and connection, about loss and the ways in which we experience it.
The film explores the bond between human beings and nature — earth, water, fire and air. Nikola is making a film about his mother, who is dying and yet living life to the fullest. She becomes his special ear, the way through which he listens to the world, to nature and to the people around him.
With its beautiful landscapes, sensitive cinematography and the presence of gentle and timid Lija, the film invites us to pause and listen. Perhaps then we too will hear what the wind is telling us.
17:00 FILM – CZECH PREMIERE
Honey Bunny (Koke)
Drama • Croatia / Serbia • 2026 • 97 min • Directed by: Igor Jelinović • Croatian • Czech / English subtitles
Starring: Snježana Sinovčić Šiškov, Aleksandra Janković, Šimun Šitum, Stojan Matavulj, Leon Lučev and others
All families are alike when property is at stake. And some even have their own Koke.
Tonina, known as Koke, is the central matriarch of a Dalmatian family, fighting to keep everything under control. But when her relationship with her younger sister collapses over an inheritance, her world starts to fall apart in a cascade of painfully funny moments that reveal how fragile even the seemingly strongest links of a family chain can be.
Igor Jelinović’s feature debut uses a powerful female character and the raw, unapologetic humour of Split to expose the many faces of the southern mentality – the warm, heartfelt, and loud, as well as the rough, uncompromising, and repressed.
20:00 FILM
God Will Not Help (Bog neće pomoći)
Drama • Croatia / Italy / Romania / Greece / France / Slovenia • 2025 • 137 min • Directed by: Hana Jušić • Croatian / Spanish • Czech / English subtitles
Starring: Manuela Martelli, Ana Marija Veselčić, Filip Đurić and others
Whenever the flock waited for someone else to save it, help never came. In a world where heads bow, turn away, and responsibility is shifted onto others, God will not help.
One night at the beginning of the 20th century, Teresa – a Chilean woman with no knowledge of the local language – arrives in an isolated shepherding community in the Dalmatian hinterland. She explains to the locals that she is the widow of Marko, their brother who emigrated from the community long ago, and that she has brought his bones to bury them in his native land. The closed community receives her with distrust, and only the marginalized Milena is able to see in her more than a threat – a reflection of her own unspoken desires.
Hana Jušić’s film is a gothic allegory rich in visual symbolism, inviting viewers – just like its characters – to seek understanding not through language but through images. In monumental shots of the Dinaric landscape and the coexistence of people and sheep, the film reveals the mechanisms of closed communities, the (im)possibility of
communication, and the search for a space of freedom for two women in a world that cannot bear change.
SUNDAY 22.11.
11:30 LITERATURE / GUEST
Meet the Writer Marko Dinić
Writer Marko Dinić will present his literary work, including the English translation of his debut novel, Dobri dani (The Good Days). The novel tells the story of a generation shaped by war, nationalism and the 1999 NATO bombing of Belgrade. Through the protagonist’s return to his hometown, it explores questions of exile, identity and the complex relationship with one’s own past. Dinić’s work captures the experience of someone who feels at home neither in their country of origin nor abroad, searching for a place of their own between personal memories and the historical events that shaped their generation.
Language: English
14:00 FILM – CZECH PREMIERE
Shorts vol. 5
Three short films bring moments of growing up that gently merge into a single truth: It's not easy to be young.
When they bloom (Bele rade)
Drama • Serbia • 2024 • 20 min • Directed by: Gvozden Ilić • Serbian • Czech / English subtitles
A group of teenagers celebrate Labor Day at a secluded house by a lake. Filip disappears, Sofija longs for affection, Isidora runs away to forget, and Alisa just wants to have a nice day. In their search for something they are missing, they all seem to forget about Filip.
A Joke (Мала шега)
Drama • North Macedonia / Croatia • 2024 • 20 min • Directed by: Trifun Sitnikovski • Macedonian • Czech / English subtitles
As Nadia nears the conclusion of her high school journey, she finds herself grappling with a pivotal decision that will shape her future. Should she stay in her hometown among the familiar and her old friends? Or should she go abroad and study? One boy makes this decision especially hard to make. When are feelings just friendship and when are they something more?
Deserters (Dezerteri)
Short Documentary • Croatia • 2022 • 45 min • Directed by: Damir Markovina • Croatian • Czech / English subtitles
All wars are the same for civilians. This is the story of some of them – teenagers from Mostar, the city of sun and light, who at the beginning of the 1990s, when a dark cloud of war descended over the city, were forced to desert from the happiest period in our lives. Thirty years later director Damir Markovina, through the letters sent to him by friends who found themselves scattered across the world as refugees, reconstructs the fragments of their abruptly interrupted youth and the shimmering light of the city they left behind – a light that, in the exiles shaping their lives, still glows within them.
17:00 FILM
Our Father (Oče naš)
Drama • Serbia / North Macedonia / Bosnia and Herzegovina / Italy / Croatia / Montenegro • 2025 • 90 min • Directed by: Goran Stanković • Serbian • Czech / English subtitles
Starring: Vučić Perović, Boris Isaković, Goran Marković and others
Our Father, who art in heaven, lead us not into the temptation to judge, but deliver us from evil within us and around us. Perhaps director Goran Stanković did not whisper this when shooting his feature debut, but God helped him. Amen.
The film follows Dejan, a thirty-two-year-old drug addict who arrives for treatment in an isolated community governed by a strict hierarchy based on religion, discipline, obedience, and punishment. It is led by the charismatic priest Branko, and Dejan gradually becomes his most devoted follower. When a video of brutal violence in the community leaks to the public, Dejan finds himself torn between his conscience and his loyalty to Father Branko.
This harrowing story, inspired by true events, reveals how faith transforms into power, and power into manipulation – until the moment when tragedy becomes inevitable.
A Q&A with director and producer Goran Stanković will follow the screening.
18:30 GUEST
Goran Stanković
A discussion with Serbian director and producer Goran Stanković, whose films and TV series (Jutro će promeniti sve, Sablja, Nečista krv and others) have received numerous international awards in recent years.
Language: Serbian (Interpretation into Czech will be provided via whispered interpreting, also known as chuchotage.)
20:30 FILM
How come it´s all green out here (Kako je ovde tako zeleno)
Drama • Serbia / Croatia / Bulgaria • 2025 • 114 min • Directed by: Nikola Ležaić • Serbian • Czech / English subtitles
Starring: Filip Đurić, Stojan Matavulj, Izudin Bajrović, Snježana Sinovčić Šiškov and others
Film director Nikola stands on the threshold of a new chapter in life: he is expecting the birth of his daughter and dreams of future journeys with his family in an old van he plans to turn into a camper. But his vision of the future is unexpectedly interrupted by the past. The news that his late grandmother — once a refugee — can finally be buried in her native village in Dalmatia sets him on a journey with his father, Mirko.
The return to the family house, left untouched for twenty-five years, gradually becomes a tender journey through landscapes, memory and family silence. How come it´s all green out here is an intimate film about fatherhood, roots, loss and the traces that time leaves within us.
Accompanying Events
Book Sales
Throughout the festival, visitors will be able to purchase a selection of translated works of South Slavic fiction, as well as contemporary literature from the catalogues of regional publishers Blum, Bulevar Books, Buybook and Booka.
Refreshments
As always, the bar will offer Balkan-inspired refreshments, including delicious burek and excellent rakija.
Vom 20.11.2026
bis 22.11.2026
Venue: Kino Přítomnost, Prague
In cooperation with:
Charles University Prague