Excursion

8. 10. 2025, Kulturni dom Nova Gorica (Nova Gorica) at 18:30—20:00

New Wave of Kosovo Short Film

Kosovo is a young country, the youngest in Europe, having declared independence in 2008. Its cinema is young too, and it only recently emerged on the international scene through a number of quality films that enjoyed successful appearances and wins at major film festivals.

When looking at the history and evolution of Kosovar cinema in the last decade, it becomes clear that the themes of ethnic conflict and the war have dominated genres and narratives. However, the contemporary Kosovar cinema is slowly moving away from these and towards more social themes, such as films about family, migration and corruption, as well as films about poverty and to some extent the dysfunctional state.

The film programme presented here offers a glimpse into a cinema of a country still trying to come to terms with its violent past, while at the same time bringing a fresh look at some of country’s best and brightest new talents. In there you’ll find films that have won important film festivals, such as Ilir Hasanaj’s exquisite short Workers’ Wings, the winner of Tiger Short Award at Rotterdam Film Festival in 2024, Norika Sefa’s mysterious and mesmerizing Like a Sick Yellow, Samir Karahoda’s Cannes competition entry On the Road and Sovran Nrecaj’s humble portrait of elderly couple in the observational doc Fran and Verka; or A Usual Day in an Abandoned Village.

The selection rounds up with a film from the distant 1976, seemingly with little or no connection to the present stylistically and thematically, but still serving as a bridge between the cinema of then and now. 117 by late, pioneering Kosovan filmmaker Besim Sahatçiu stands as a milestone for Kosovo’s documentary filmmaking, a piece of ethnography cinema par excellence and can be regarded as the most readily apparent piece of history within the whole programme. Cross-BordeCross-

That most of the filmmakers in this program are young is a testament to their resilience and creativity and a proof that the recently coined phrase “New Kosovo Wave” is well deserved. Also, the fact that majority of filmmakers have attended or made their first films at DokuFest’s training programmes is added testament to the importance of the festival for the Kosovar filmmaking scene.    

Veton Nurkollari

Artistic Director

DokuFest