Bosnian film Quo Vadis, Aida set around the Srebenica massacre of 1995 during the Bosnian war, will be the opening film of the 25th International Film Festival of Kerala to be held from February 10.
The film looks at the impending massacre through the eyes of Aida, the UN translator in Srebenica, whose family is also among the citizens of Srebenica trying to get shelter in the UN camp.
The Srebenica massacre, in which more than 8,000 Muslims perished, was one of the most gruesome incidents of mass violence during the Bosnian war.
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Many stories
For Bosnian filmmaker Jasmila Zbanic, this is not her first attempt at telling the many stories associated with that protracted war that changed the face of her homeland. In 2006, she made Grbavica , which talked about the systematic rape of Bosnian women by Serb soldiers during the war. The film went on to win the Golden Bear award at the Berlin International Film Festival that year.
Her latest film too featured at the competition section at the Venice International Film Festival and was chosen as Bosnia's entry for the Best International Feature Film at the 93rd Academy Awards. At the IFFK, the film will be screened at the Nishagandhi theatre, as the opening film.
Meanwhile, the registration of delegates for the IFFK, which opened on Saturday, is moving at a slower pace compared to the previous years. As on Sunday morning, 24 hours after the registrations opened, only around 1,000 registrations, out of a total of 2,500 passes available, were done. Compared to this, in the previous years, more than 1,000 registrations were done in the first hour of registrations opening, even when close to 10,000 passes were available. The increasing number of COVID-19 cases in recent days seems to have tempered the enthusiasm of film buffs.
No rush
The organising of the festival in four phases across four regions in Kerala also seems to have reduced the rush for delegate passes for the festival happening in the capital city. On Saturday, some delegates experienced issues with the payment gateway after the registrations opened.
